Lot 140
Pre-Columbian, South Coast Peru, Nazca culture, ca. 100 to 300 CE. A gorgeous and sizable textile mantle comprised of tightly-woven camelid (alpaca or llama wool) fibers in hues of crimson, cobalt, goldenrod, and cream. The rectangular mantle features wondrous geometric patterns consisting of red and dark-blue panels arranged in a checkerboard pattern with the red areas filled with petite yellow-orange rectangles and the blue with white rectangles, all resembling stepping stones when viewed from above. While many fine Nazca textiles display highly abstract anthropomorphic or zoomorphic imagery, larger examples like this bear minimalist yet poignant geometric motifs. Mounted on a large display frame. Size (textile): 69" W x 45.5" H (175.3 cm x 115.6 cm); (frame): 74.125" W x 51.25" H (188.3 cm x 130.2 cm)
In Nazca cemeteries, the deceased were wrapped in layers of cloth. Elite people were given brightly decorated textiles like this one along with jewelry adorned with colorful feathers and precious metals. The imagery and colors were intended to convey the veneration of the deceased individual as well as to form a bridge between the living and the dead, and larger textiles would have taken countless hours to create. Analyses of similar textiles in museum collections have shown that the color and motif choices were complex and systematic with some deeper meaning about which modern scholars can only hypothesize.
Provenance: ex-private C. Webster collection, Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA, acquired before 2000; ex-Bob Duff collection
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#155851
- Condition: Minor losses to some interior and peripheral areas, with light staining and fading to original colors, and separation to some interior panels. Nice remains of original colors throughout.
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