Totonicapán, Guatemala
1875, published 1877
Medium
Photography-Photoprint
Classification
Photography-Photoprint
Department
Smithsonian Collection
Museum
Smithsonian American Art Museum
Credit
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Jeffrey A. Lichtenberg in honor of his parents Laura and Harold Lichtenberg
Accession Number
1999.97.29
Tags
Art Historical Context
**Totonicapán, Guatemala** (1875, published 1877) captures a vibrant figure group in the mountainous highlands of Totonicapán, Guatemala through the lens of pioneering photographer Eadweard Muybridge This photoprint from the Smithsonian American Art Museum a civic scene amid dramatic peaks, likely featuring indigenous Maya people in everyday or communal activity. Muybridge, renowned for his groundbreaking motion studies, ventured to Central America during this period, documenting remote landscapes and cultures with remarkable clarity. As one of Muybridge's early documentary works, the image h...
About the Artist
Eadweard Muybridge · 1830–1904
Eadweard Muybridge (1830-1904) was an English-American photographer who revolutionized the understanding of motion through his pioneering chronophotographic studies. Born Edward James Muggeridge in Kingston upon Thames, England, he emigrated to America and became famous first for his dramatic landscape photographs of Yosemite Valley, then for his groundbreaking motion studies that proved horses li...