Maya Blue: Painting from the Past in the Present

The clay-dye composite 'Maya Blue' was made in Mesoamerica from as early as the third century CE until shortly after the conquest of the region by Spain in the 16th century. Codices, pottery, wall paintings and sculptures were painted with this pigment and today, Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists are recreating it using new practices.

The archaeological fascination with the ‘Maya blue’ pigment owes in part to its chromatic properties, which deteriorate little over time and are resistant to diluted mineral acids, alkalis, solvents, oxidants, reducing agents, moderate heat and biocorrosion.

Archaeologists and art historians have also pointed to the complex chemistry involved in its fabrication, as well as the aesthetic qualities associated with its application, particularly in wall-painting.

Although the colour was also used in the 16th century to decorate Franciscan churches in Yucatan, it ceased to be produced shortly thereafter and, as such, there have been no published studies of Indigenous methods in the process of making Maya Blue.

Some of the objects from the British Museum’s Mesoamerican collection still show traces of ‘Maya blue’.

Piece of plaster or stucco, Belize. Am1974,11.244

Mask made of pottery, Mexico. Am1856,0422.66

Stucco figure from Tulum, Mexico; Am1991,Q.3

Yaxchilan Lintel 24, Chiapas, Mexico. Am1923,Maud.4

Relief of maya glyph made of stucco, Belize. Am1938,1021.403

Pottery vessel in the shape of an inverted human-like head, Palenque, Mexico. Am1986,Q.78

Bird-shaped whistle made of pottery, Mexico. Am1844,0720.907

New perspectives

Scientists identified the characteristics of this pigment in the 1960s, defining it as a nanostructured material produced by heating palygorskite, a naturally occurring fibrous phyllosilicate mineral, with a needle-like structure together with a pre-Columbian species of indigo (either I.suffructicosa or I.guatalamensis, ch’oh in Yucatec Mayan).

Although they have long experimented with its fabrication, Indigenous and non- Indigenous artists in Southern Mexico are now producing the colour using Indigenous methodologies and artistic sensibilities.

Muitle Plant ©Lorena Ancona

This project will overturn the interpretational frameworks that have, until now, been used to study this complex pigment, using an interdisciplinary framework comprising Indigenous epistemologies, artistic experimentation and materials science.

Not only will this politically engaged process elucidate aspects of the pre-Colombian pigment that have been ignored by scientists working in laboratories, it will also champion multivocal and local methodologies.

Pottery figure painted with Maya Blue ©Luis May

The contemporary artists affiliated to this project are currently adopting Indigenous methodologies to experiment with the pigment.

Preliminary ethnographic research has also shown that other blue dyes, such as those extracted from lonchocarpus spp. branches, may have been employed to produce Maya Blue.

These species are endemic to Mesoamerica and may have been used in place of indigofera spp. in certain regions; however, the Franciscan missionaries may have avoided their use because of their Indigenous religious significance: Lonchocarpus violaceus, for example, was (and continues to be) widely used to make the Maya alcoholic ritual drink, balché.

This project will analyse the molecular composition of contemporary Maya Blue alongside traces of the pigment on British Museum collections to compare Maya Blue made using contemporary Indigenous methods with those made in a laboratory.

The research group hypothesises that local processes and materials more closely resemble the blue in historical sources and pigments. These analyses on objects may also identify alternative sources of blue colourants to indigo and Maya Blue, such as the use of Justicia spicigera (muitle) and Commelina coelestis.

Moreover, this project aims to acknowledge the multi-temporality of heritage – as well as the importance of emphasising Indigenous culture continuity. The researchers, some of whom are Indigenous, are predominantly from the region and as such, the project constitutes an ontological appropriation of heritage interpretations by Indigenous and local people.

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