The Murals of Cacaxtla: The Power of Painting in Ancient Central Mexico by Claudia Lozoff Brittenham (review)

The 1975 discovery of vibrant murals at Cacaxtla, a little known pre-Hispanic site east of Mexico City, generated fascination, adulation, and astonishment. Further archaeological excavations revealed more exquisitely painted walls, many depicting humans and deities in recognizable Maya style, juxtaposed with central Mexican motifs. The most impressive is a 20-meter long battle scene depicting horrific hand-to-hand combat among 49 near life-size warriors. The murals flummoxed scholars. How could one explain this blend of two separate artistic traditions? Did Maya artists travel 700 kilometers to central Mexico? Did Maya peoples conquer Cacaxtla?

While several studies of Cacaxtla’s murals have appeared since the 1980s, Brittenham’s book stands out. It is illustrated with superb full-color photographs from the UNAM project La Pintura Mural Prehispánica en México. The author provides a comprehensive treatment of the painting program at Cacaxtla that is grounded in exhaustive research into its archaeology, iconography, and culture history. The murals are discussed in architectural and functional contexts as these were modified over time. Finally, Brittenham’s sophisticated art-historical approach to their analysis is a most important contribution.

Cacaxtla’s small acropolis is located near more prominent central Mexican centers, including Xochitecatl, Cholula, and the greatest city of all, Teotihuacan, 70 kilometers to the northwest. Teotihuacan figures prominently in Cacaxtla’s apogee during the Epiclassic period when the paintings were made. The Epiclassic was marked by widespread political turmoil beginning with Teotihuacan’s decline in AD 600–650 and ending with the “collapse” of the Classic Maya civilization ca. 950. Cacaxtla’s murals share obvious similarities with the earlier wall paintings of Teotihuacan, but the former’s artists were also influenced by contemporary Maya painting, such as the famous battle mural at Bonampak.

Brittenham’s novel approach to the paintings advances our understanding of Cacaxtla and the Epiclassic period and provides insights into the role of public art. Using archaeological information and radiocarbon dates, she presents the murals in the likely order of their creation, rather than in the order of their discovery. She demonstrates how the paintings form a single dynamic and innovative tradition, as later artworks cited earlier ones or literally incorporated an earlier painting in a new composition. She also considers how later building phases buried or changed the meanings of earlier paintings.

Following two introductory chapters on Cacaxtla’s historical and geographical context and the technical aspects of the paintings, Brittenham describes and interprets the different mural groups, from earliest to latest: the Serpent Corridor and Captive Stair, the Temple of Venus, the Battle Mural, the Red Temple with a “Maya” Merchant God, and the Maya-like figures painted on the door jambs of Structure A. Her analysis emphasizes the “power of painting” in elite visual programs, based on its potentially polyvalent interpretations, low cost in comparison to stone carving, and openness to modification.

Significantly, Brittenham dismisses the twinned issues of style and ethnicity that have dominated interpretations of Cacaxtla’s artworks. She cogently observes that “style” is often read as a sign of “ethnicity,” in circular fashion, and argues instead that Cacaxtla artists and their patrons developed a local painting program that blended select elements from different artistic traditions, rather than aligning themselves to a specific outside group. The unique style they derived formed a resolutely local “visual identity” during a tumultuous time of political jockeying. Cacaxtla artists ably assimilated widespread Mesoamerican religious themes and icons, such as the feathered serpent or Venus imagery, and then interpreted them in new ways.

Brittenham’s conclusion is revelatory for all of Mesoamerican archaeology and art history. She observes that all artists borrowed, adapted, and transformed styles and images, concluding that it would be futile to search for the “origin” of some motif in a particular site or...