Customer Reviews

Designs from Pre-Columbian Mexico (Dover Pictorial Archive)

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I have both books by the late Jorge Enciso who did the world a great service by carefully collecting these various designs from the archeological digs of the Mexicas, Toltecs, Totonacs and others.All the designs are black and white and come from various museums and private colections including that of the great Mexican painter Diego Rivera. The designs come from malacates which were small spindles made of clay by the pre-columbiam cultures. There are approximately 2-4 designs per page which allows for clarity for the artists use for reproduction. With the use of computers many of these images may be reproduced for use in any type of creative endeavor where a Mexican motiff is desired. An artist may find the designs inspirational for a new creation or use the existing image as is. Simple geometric designs, including images of humans, animals, flowers both real and imagined give a concise and visual glimpse at the ancient cultures imagery . This is an excellent source book that is useful for a variety of projects and applications for all interested in pre-columbian motiffs. Recommended for teachers, students and artists of all ages. Guaranteed to amaze all with the simplicity of the motiffs yet astound with the imaginative results. This is a worthwhile addition to ones personal libray to be filed under Art or Mexico. School librarians would be helping their students by adding this to their collection of books.

I hate to confess this, but this is a book that I have used for a number of years but am too cheap to buy. Therefore, when I need it, I check it out from the local library. I do this often and the librarian has gotten to the point where she sort of raises her eyebrows at me each time I drag it up to the desk.

As a winter, and sometimes summer, hobby I work with gourds. I carve, paint, burn, etch, draw on, and shape different hard shell gourds and have for years. I raise my own; several verities and sizes. The reason I use this particular book, along with quite a number of others, is for inspiration, and to be quite frank, to borrow the designs which I then transfer to my gourd art. My special interest is in designs of "lost civilizations" and cultures. When I am in need of a pre-columbian or a Mexican motif, I turn to this small volume. It is accurate and due to the computer enhancements, very easy to follow. With a bit of practice on paper, I am able to pretty well copy the pattern to any surface I happen to be working on. I do, on many of the designs, modify them to fit my particular need or mood.

In addition, I also make custom canes for people, using hickory for the most part. The designs I find in this book are easily transferred and then carved into the piece I am working on. This spring I plan to start working on primitive clay tiles and plan to use some of the designs found in this volume. We shall see how that works out.

All in all, this is an excellent book and I suppose I should eventually breakdown and buy it. If you are interested in such things, this is a work you cannot go wrong with.

Don Blankenship
The Ozarks

To be blunt- this book is way too basic. It is simply black and white images with no descriptive elements (besides the most obvious) or educational components. If a person is looking for designs and designs only--because there is nothing else--then it can work. However, if you are looking for history, color, change in designs, interpretations of the symbolism, or anything about the culture what so ever then you should select a different book.