The Walters Art Museum claims to present “a comprehensive history of art from the third millennium B.C. to the early 20th century.” And when it comes to many parts of the world, it does. But until recently, the collection lacked art from our own hemisphere. Then, in 2008, in the depths of the recession, the museum received a phone call. “What a bright spot in a gloomy time,” Director Gary Vikan recalls. It was thus the museum learned it would receive a rich collection of pre-Columbian art belonging to collector John Bourne, totaling more than 300 pieces.

Exploring Art of the Ancient Americas: The John Bourne Collection is a sampling of 135 of those pieces, from civilizations of Mexico and Central and South America, including the Teotihuacan, Olmec, Maya, Andean, Aztec, and Mixtec. The exhibition spans 4,000 years and is composed of a staggering variety of objects—funeral vessels, jewelry, earthenware figurines, masks, and more—and represents an equally varied range of styles. It also comes with a swashbuckling back-story: John Bourne, heir to the Singer sewing machine fortune, began collecting art of the ancient Americas after traveling to the jungles of southern Mexico in 1945 when he was still a teenager. He befriended members of the Lacandon, the last indigenous Maya with little previous contact with the modern world. He conducted a bit of informal ethnography, and his recordings of their music play in the exhibition gallery. (Bourne tells the tale of his adventure and shares his fascinating photographs in the accompanying catalog.)

So began a lifetime of avid collecting, decades before most people considered such artifacts art. Bourne’s collection has never been the subject of a major exhibition before; following the show, the Walters plans to build a permanent new collection of art from the Western hemisphere around it. (Along with the artwork, Bourne has given the museum a bequest of $4 million for the research, conservation, display, and teaching of the arts of the ancient Americas, adding to a $3.25 million bequest from another donor with a similar focus.) “This is a really excellent seed collection,” says Dorie Reents-Budet, consulting curator for the exhibition and curator at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. “It’s a very good foundation.”

The exhibition is divided into Mesoamerica, Central America, and Andean South America. Expansive, often bilingual wall text and labels guide the visitor along and dispense tantalizing factoids. (Near a collection of delightful dog effigies, for example, one learns that the ancestors of the hairless Chihuahua were nearly driven to extinction in the 16th century by the Spanish, who pickled and ate them on their transoceanic voyages.) And the pieces themselves, which represent an astonishing array of styles, are likely to dispel any prejudices you may have about pre-Columbian art.

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