Culture of Kuna brought to life at Maxwell Museum exhibit

Staff Report

UNM's Maxwell Museum of Anthropology will sponsor a roundtable discussion and reception with Kuna visitors from Panama as part of The Art of Being Kuna exhibition.

The discussion, which will explore aspects of the Kuna visitors' lifestyle and practices, is slated for 11 a.m. The reception is scheduled from noon to 2 p.m.

Cultural explorations such as Mola-making demonstrations, children's activities and arm and leg band crafting will be available throughout the day. Items from the Mola Co-op will be for sale.

The Kuna people occupy the Carribean coast of Panama from Punta San Blas to the Colombian border. The stretch of land is about 130 miles long. One cornerstone of the Kuna belief system is the continued effort to honor the environment by protecting it from exploitation and overuse.

The exhibition is a collaborative project based on anthropological field research of from the past 30 years. The Maxwell Museum's Chief Curator Mari Lyn Salvador contributed to this research. Salvador worked alongside Kuna artists, cultural specialists and Fowler Museum staff members to create the exhibition.

Kuna clothing, ethnographic objects, video programs and photographs will be on display along with interpretive text. These items are intended examine the aesthetics behind the Kuna's creation beliefs and the strong responsibility they feel toward the environment. It will also explore the relationship of beauty to political and social structures, family, hospitality, expression and ritual.

The Art of Being Kuna will use photographs archived from the 1920's at the Ethnographic Museum in Goteborg, Sweden, the Smithsonian Museum in Washington D.C. and the Heye Foundation in New York.

Funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Ethel Jane Bunting Foundation and Pachamama, the exhibition will be on display for two years. During that time, many educational programs and lectures will be given to further understand the nature of the display. These programs are co-sponsored by the Alfonso Ortiz Center for Intercultural Studies.

A second phase of the The Art of Being Kuna will open in April 2003, and will include images inspired by cards, labels and comic books.

For more information call, 277-5813.