Creatures of Myth and Imagination: Europe and The Americas

By Julia Perratore, Laura Filloy Nadal, and Joanne Pillsbury

Fantastical hybrid creatures have existed in art since the earliest cave paintings, created more than 50,000 years ago. This volume considers the universe of mythical beasts formed by artists from cultures in two parts of the world that had no direct contact prior to the fifteenth century: the ancient Americas—Latin America before 1600—and western medieval Europe. Authors explore how Indigenous traditions and lore of the European Middle Ages combined features of humans, animals, vegetables, and even minerals into new beings, transforming the natural into the supernatural. This Bulletin reveals the universal challenges faced by sculptors, metalsmiths, and weavers when giving form to their fanciful creations in these separate but parallel traditions of creature-making. Exploring the extraordinary scope of human ingenuity, Creatures of Myth and Imagination reintroduces us to uncanny beings that have perplexed, amused, frightened, and enchanted over the course of history, prompting us to consider our place within the vast web of nature.