Object Record
Images
Metadata
Catalog number |
2002.7.23 |
Artist |
Unknown |
Title |
Coca bag (ch'uspa) |
Date |
1200-1450 |
Object Name |
Bag |
Description |
This Coca bag (ch'uspa) is woven with cotton warp and wool weft in red, blue, yellow, green, and white on a brown background in a multi-stripe design, and has separately woven strap in a zig-zag pattern. 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. Citation: Extract taken from essay by Julia Clapp, "Inca Textiles" in "Natural and Supernatural: Andean Textiles and Material Culture," (G -T M, Queens College, CUNY, September 8 - October 24, 2009), 35. |
Medium/Material |
Cotton, camelid thread |
Dimensions |
W-7.75 L-7 inches |
Year Range from |
1200 |
Year Range to |
1450 |
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 |