Mestizo Art Post-Conquest

• Mestizo= ìmixed race,î mixed, hybrid. Refers to biological descendants of natives & Spanish; also to art w/ both European and Aztec/indigenous aspects but neither wholly one nor the other

• combined indigenous art technology with Europeanized forms of representation

• Includes Christian or Christianized themes, motifs, and messages with native motifs and style

• Became increasingly ìthree-dimensionalî

• Often carried both pictographs and Spanish script annotations

• Double duty: helped Christianize the natives; helped Spanish to administrate natives through familiar visual forms

Huetxotzinco Codex uses native visual forms to depict an increasingly Spanish-Christian world. Shows tribute of corn, turkey, chili peppers and beans, adobe bricks, lumber, limestone and woven cloth. Also shows amount of gold and feathers needed to create

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