John F. López has been spending his Winter and Spring Quarters researching at the John Carter Brown Library, Brown University, where he has been a long-term NEH fellow. At the JCB Library, John is researching and writing The Aquatic Metropolis, a comparative study of Aztec and Spanish flood control practices on Mexico City’s urban form.  The Aquatic Metropolis  examines the visual culture of water—maps, drawings, and paintings of Mexico City and its surrounding environs made by European and indigenous artists, such as those images found in Durán, Sahagún and Native codices. 

On April 3, John will be a speakers for “Fluidity: Knowing Water in the Early Americas,” an interdisciplinary panel on water organized as part of the Institute at Brown for Environment and Society’s Water’s Edge programming.