Khristin Landry Montes
PhD, 2018: Pre-Columbian Art of Mesoamerica
About
Khristin Landry Montes is currently an assistant professor at Cornell College in Mount Vernon, Iowa. She is a broadly trained art historian who teaches Pre-Columbian art and architecture, global contemporary art, and the art of border walls and spaces. Khristin believes art history is a dynamic discipline capable of creating positive social change in the world. She teaches students the history of art from a variety of cultural perspectives and incorporates experiences with art into the classroom. With additional training in museum studies, anthropology, and archaeology, Khristin also serves as an affiliated researcher with the NGO InHerit—Indigenous Heritage Passed to Present—through the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Recently, she has served as the project facilitator with InHerit’s Yucatec Cenotes Heritage and Conservation Project in Yucatán, Mexico. Funded by National Geographic, this project is a collaboration involving InHerit, the Universidad de Oriente (UNO) in Yucatán, Mexico, and nine middle schools in Maya communities in Yucatán. In addition to community development projects, Khristin’s research interests include the structure of urban landscapes in the ancient Maya world, materials and meaning in Mesoamerican art, and the production of maps in New Spain.
Selected Publications
(2016) “On Practices of Inclusion and Exclusion: Exhibiting Native American, Maya, and African Objects at the Field Museum and Art Institute of Chicago.” The International Journal of the Inclusive Museum 10(2):11-36.
Dissertation:
(2018) The Sacred Landscape of Mayapán, a Postclassic Maya Center. Chaired by Virginia E. Miller.