Object Record
Images
Metadata
Catalog number |
2002.7.45 |
Artist |
Unknown |
Title |
Inca Fez Style Hat |
Date |
1340-1470 |
Object Name |
Hat |
Description |
Inca Fez style hat in natural color cammaloid wools of brown, tan, gray, and black, woven around a vegetable fiber (coiled), The Fez style hat was only found in Chile during the 70-year Inca occupation of Northern Chile Referred to as the "Fez" type because of its similarity to the truncated cone shape of theTurkish Fez. The construction technique is known in basketry as "coiling". A weft of fine camelid threads is looped around a thick coil of the same fiber. (David Bernstein Fine Art- similar examples shown) Marianne Hogue has suggested that the patterns most commonly found in Inca textiles - the step, the zigzag and the rectangle - have political and agricultural significance. A visual representation of reality was a lesser priority than the aesthetic impact of pattern and color and repetition. Pre-Columbian Andeans chose geometry and abstraction as the best means to communicate their ideas, though artists were certainly capable of creating naturalistic representations of the world as can be seen in remarkably sophisticated naturalistic ceramic portrait vessels made by the Moche culture. |
Medium/Material |
Camelid wool, coiled vegetable fiber |
Dimensions |
H-6 Dia-6 inches |
Year Range from |
1340 |
Year Range to |
1470 |
Exhibition and Publication History |
* "Natural and Supernatural: Andean Textiles and Material Culture," Godwin-Ternbach Museum, Queens College, CUNY, September 8 - October 24, 2009. |
Culture |
Inca/Chilean |