Aztec wonders in Chicago.

IN OCTOBER of this year, visitors to the Field Museum in Chicago will have the opportunity to view a never-before-seen exhibit about Mexico's ancient Aztec civilization. The new temporary exhibit, The Aztec World, includes priceless artifacts on loan from Mexico City's National Museum of Anthropology and the Templo Mayor Museum. Many of these objects have never been shown outside of Mexico and will be on display only at the Field Museum. Nearly 300 artifacts, including stone monuments, vivid ceramics, and detailed jewelry, will be used to tell the story of one of the world's most impressive empires.

The exhibit mirrors the Aztec people's transformation-between 1325 and 1521--from wandering nomads to an empire that supported 200,000 inhabitants. Museum visitors enter the exhibit at Lake Texcoco, now a small marsh outside Mexico City, where the Aztec made their first permanent settlement. Displays bring to life the Aztec farming culture, showing how they grew beans and maize, and domesticated turkeys and dogs. The exhibit highlights the creativity of these early farmers, who were able to grow crops in swampland by mounding dirt into mini-islands for farming. "We wanted to include objects that would be used by all the different kinds of people who contributed to the Aztec world: farmers, artisans, women, merchants, and war co-curator and Northwestern University anthropology professor Elizabeth Brumfiel. Further into the exhibit, visitors explore the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan. A reproduction of Diego Rivera's mural "The Great City of Tenochtitlan" models the vibrant marketplace that serviced nearly 60,000 people a day. "Spanish accounts report. that the Aztec markets were larger and more diverse than the conquistadors had ever seen," says exhibit co-curator and Field Museum anthropologist Gary Feinman.

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One of the most impressive artifacts in the exhibit is a life-size terra cotta statue of the Eagle Man. The duality of his role is evident in his human face--embedded in a bird's open beak--his winged arms, human hands, and taloned legs with human feet. He watches over the gallery dedicated to the history of the Aztec warrior. Fierce and well-trained warriors dominated the Aztec culture, and the exhibit ends with the final Aztec war against a small group of Spaniards aided by hundreds of rebellious indigenous people from throughout present-day Mexico. Although the empire was brought down, the exhibit shows that the Aztec culture lives on in food, medicine, and art.

During the months of the exhibit, the museum will offer supplementary educational programs, including performances by Nahul Ollin, a Chicago-based dance troupe specializing in indigenous ceremonial dances, and Michael Heralda, who uses poetry, ballads, and narrative to tell the story of ancient Mexico from an indigenous point of view.

The Field Museum is one of the premier museums in the United States sponsoring research and educational programs featuring the Americas of pre-Columbian times. In March 2007 the museum opened a 19,000-square-foot exhibit titled The Ancient Americas, one of the country's largest permanent exhibits on the topic. "A generation ago, little attention was paid to pre-Hispanic history. Today, Latin Americans make up one third of Chicago's population," says Feinman. "In our multi-ethnic society, it's critical to have an appreciation for different cultures. We have to move beyond the notion that most advances come from the Euro-American tradition."

To organize The Aztec World, Field Museum staff worked with Council of Culture and Art (CONACULTA) the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH). The exhibit will run exclusively at the Field Museum from October 31 until April 19, 2009.

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