Decoding art: the Staff God relief from Chavín de Huántar (part 2)
About this video
The second part of the Staff God close-reading shows that the god's face is made of several faces sharing the same features. The narrator introduces contour rivalry, an artistic technique where parts of an image can be read in more than one way, and shows how it also multiplies the fangs in the god's enormous headdress.
You'll be able to
- define contour rivalry.
- explain how one mouth can belong to two faces on the Staff God.
Key words
- contour rivalry
- An artistic technique where parts of an image can be visually interpreted in multiple ways.
- headdress
- An ornamental covering worn on the head.
Transcript
- [Instructor] The god's face is actually composed of multiple faces. The eyes in the center looking upward are above a down-turned mouth sporting feline fangs, but beneath that, we can see another upside down pair of eyes and a nose that use the same mouth. This is an artistic technique known as contour rivalry where parts of an image can be visually interpreted in multiple ways.
A similar thing is taking place on the god's forehead where we see another upside down mouth with four large fangs protruding from it, which when associated with the eyes in the middle, completes a full face. Above this multi-faced head is what appears to be an enormous headdress which is composed of more fangs that also multiply using contour rivalry and have extensions emanating from them that terminate in curls and snake heads.
Video © Khan Academy, used under CC BY-NC-SA. Watch on Khan Academy. Puzzicle is not affiliated with Khan Academy.