In Maya mythology there is a god with a man’s body and a bat’s head, pointy ears and part of his face covered with a mask; they called him Camazotz. Does he remind you of someone?

The Maya codex describes Camazotz holding a knife of sacrifices in one hand; and his victim in the other. However, there are no more representations of this god.

Camazotz, the Maya “Batman” (image taken from a Maya codex)

Five centuries had to go by for the bat-headed Maya man to be represented in something similar to an effigy:

In 2014 Warner Bros Entertainment summoned 30 artists to reinterpret Batman on the occasion of its 75th anniversary. One of those who accepted the assignment was Christian Pacheco, owner of the design firm Kimbal, based in Yucatán, Mexico.

He recalled that Batman, perhaps to the sadness of some followers of DC Comics, is not the first reference of an enigmatic anthropomorphic being with a man’s body and a bat’s head. The first world reference of something like that was the feared Camazotz.

His studio made a replica of the bust with which Bruce Wayne disguises the character and molded it with Maya motifs and references to the ancient Camazotz, and the result was the main photo that illustrates this article.

The reinterpretation amazed everyone who saw it and the bust was taken to the Batman exhibition that was held in February 2015 at the Mexican Museum of Design (Mumedi).

No one knows who bought it or for how much, but surely whoever took it was amazed with the symbiosis of the piece, which combines the contemporary world of DC Comics with ancient Maya mythology. That exhibition, said Christian Pacheco, was the last place where he saw his work; as he lost the trail of it forever.

Source: Mexico Desconocido







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