Textile fragment
Artist
Peru
Date1100-1300AD
MediumCotton and wool
ClassificationsMaterials
Credit LineGift of Henry Schnakenberg
Object number1945.3.6
DescriptionTextile fragment consisting of loosely woven cotton gauze, upon which eleven figures have been embroidered in wool. The wool is medium-fine mono-ply fiber, highly lustrous and therefore probably alpaca. The cotton base is mono-ply finely spun plain weave and undyed white. The figures, approx. 15 cm high and 13 cm wide are geometrically identical and equally spaced in two horizontal rows of three or three rows of two. They are good examples of the highly stereotyped human figures most commonly found on Chimu textiles, a frontally presented form with displayed limbs and headdress in the shape of a truncated cone with drooping extensions. These figures are brown with subsidiary details in yellow and red. The piece is part of a larger textile probably bordered originally on all four sides. The surviving border at top and left is overall, 75cm x 65cm. Border along top and left side is worn. :Lower right figure extremely worn and frayed. Embroidered in red with superimposed yellow Chimu-style birds. Added to the border at left is a sewn-on strip which may have been added later (the joining threads are modern). It is made in four vertical strips alternating tapestry weave and gauze, with fringe at one edge, all in a very fine glossy brown fiber (wool or cotton). The textile as a whole was probably made on a backstrap loom which limited its width, as it has been joined down the middle (one side surviving in the only very fragmentary condition, with only two embroidered figures) the two sides sharing a common border.On View
Not on viewCollections
c. 1900
19th-20th c.
