This is a photo from when Claudia Zapata, a Mesoamerican iconography Scholar from UT Austin was teaching the Sarita El Tigre Art Camp participants the Mesoamerican time line in the Ben Bailey Gallery at TAMUK.
Claudia drove all the way from Austin to be a visiting scholar to this program. Claudia spent an entire week going over Mayan history and working with the students on "Mayan Codices".
Here is an example of the completed version of TJ's Mayan Codice.
Claudia used the brainstorming stories that the children and I had worked on to create the storyboards for their films in my workshop the week before and recycled the stories into these gorgeous original art pieces.
I was busy working on video projects when by the end of the event, Claudia quizzed the students on Mayan iconography. On the last day of the project she asked the students, as they rested at their "Pizza Party" outside the Ben Bailey Gallery of the campus, "Whoever can say what this Mesoamerican symbol stands for in English gets these free Mayan iconography coloring books!"
I looked at Claudia in disbelief. As a Chicana myself I never thought the kids would be able to decipher a sculpture that sat outside the campus building. We all watched in amazement as Ryan only 10 years old raised his hand.
Claudia prompted him for the answer.
Ryan quietly blurted, "Movement."
My jaw dropped, and we all praised him for his achievement.
The children never ceased to amaze me.
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