Science Museum of MinnesotaChiapas Collection Archival Digitization Project


Photograph Catalog Number: RC001_445
The Chiapas collection at SMM was assembled between the late 1970s and the early 2010s to document and celebrate the vibrant culture and art of the Maya of the region. The collection illustrates a remarkable cultural resilience that recalls the Pre-Columbian past, while also capturing the influences of globalization and international tourism of the last 40 years.

The collection includes textiles purchased from artists from over a dozen individual Maya communities, weaving tools, and other items of modern Maya material culture, and an extensive ethnographic photo archive that illustrates both artisan work and daily life in the Chiapas highlands.

My role was to digitize Chiapas photographic materials from the 1970s–1990s by Jeffrey Foxx, Christiana Dittmann and Lou B. Casagrande to name a few. I cataloged over 1,000 images while developing and maintaining collections management protocols. A necessary aspect of cataloging the images was photo restoration to ensure the longevity of the artifacts. Additionally, I worked on matching the physical artifacts, such as weaving materials and huipil’s to their digital counterparts.

View a few of my favorite photographs and huipils below. (Photograph catalog numbers are included; however, these artifacts may not yet be available through SMM’s online collection.)

View Online Collection


Chiapas_294

RC001_420
RC001_462
RC001_462

RC004_017

Chiapas_170

Chiapas_297
RC001_398