Panel
1000-1476
Medium
Cotton, plain weave; painted
Dimensions
101.9 × 62.9 cm (40 1/8 × 24 3/4 in.)
Classification
textile
Department
Textiles
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
22343
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
This vibrantly painted panel depicts a central figure framed by felines and fish. The figure wears a crescent headdress on a trapezoidal head while spindly limbs extend from its robustly rounded triangular torso. Although the artist was working with common motifs, the individual’s hand and creativity are discernible through the variations in line thickness and intensity of color. With only a single colorant, the artist was able to create multiple forms through the use of a defining, colorless ou...
About the Artist
Chancay
The Chancay were a pre-Columbian culture that flourished along the central coast of Peru, in the valleys of the Huaura, Chancay, Chillón, and surrounding rivers, from approximately 1000 to 1470 CE. Emerging after the decline of the Wari civilization, the Chancay developed a distinctive artistic identity that set them apart from their Andean contemporaries, one defined above all by extraordinary ma...