2010.52.3
Temple 33 and Temple 20, Yaxchilan, Mexico
Artist
Marilyn Bridges
(Newark, New Jersey, 12/26/1948 - )
Title
Temple 33 and Temple 20, Yaxchilan, Mexico
Creation Date
1982
Century
late 20th century
Dimensions
20 in. x 24 in. (50.8 cm x 60.96 cm)
Classification
Photographs
Creation Place
North America, United States
Medium and Support
silver gelatin print on paper
Credit Line
Gift of Mark Greenberg and Tami Morachnick
Copyright
This artwork may be under copyright. For further information, please consult the Museum’s
Copyright Terms and Conditions.
Accession Number
2010.52.3
Marilyn Bridges is an American photographer and pilot known for her aerial landscapes. Here, a bird’s-eye view reveals the effects of time and the staying power of history in Mexico’s changing landscapes. From her elevated vantage point, glowing white temples contrast with the dark shadows of the trees, lending the ancient ruins an almost sacred luminescence. Bridges utilizes dynamic light to emphasize the relationship between forms. The juxtaposition of the ruins with the encroaching vegetation suggests the conflicting impulses to modernize Mexico without forgetting the past.
Emma Lawry ’20
“El paisaje es histórico, y por lo tanto se convierte en un documento en el cifrado, un texto jeroglífico. Las oposiciones entre el mar y la tierra, la llanura y la montaña, la isla y el continente, simbolizan las oposiciones históricas: sociedades, culturas, civilizaciones. Cada tierra es una sociedad: un mundo y una visión del mundo y del otro mundo.”
“Landscape is historical, and thus becomes a document in cipher, a hieroglyphic text. The oppositions between sea and land, plain and mountain, island and continent, symbolize historical oppositions: societies, cultures, civilizations. Each land is a society: a world and a vision of the world and the otherworld.”
Octavio Paz
El laberinto de la soledad (1950)
