# Containing the Divine | Ancient Peruvian Pots

> By Hugo C. Ikehara-Tsukayama, Dawn Kriss and Joanne Pillsbury. The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin Spring 2023

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CONTAINING ANCIENT THE PERUVIAN DIVINE POTS THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART BULLETIN SPRING 2023

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CONTAINING ANCIENT THE PERUVIAN DIVINE POTS Hugo C. Ikehara-Tsukayama Dawn Kriss Joanne Pillsbury The Metropolitan Museum of Art New York

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The Metropolitan’s quarterly Bulletin program is supported in Front and back cover illustrations: details of bottle with caiman, part by the Lila Acheson Wallace Fund for The Metropolitan Cupisnique, Tembladera, Peru, 1000–800 bce (fig. 14). Inside Museum of Art, established by the cofounder of Reader’s Digest. front cover: detail of Francisco Laso (Peruvian, 1823–1869), The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, Spring 2023 Inhabitant of the Peruvian Cordilleras, 1855. Oil on canvas, Volume LXXX, Number 4 54 ⼀欀 × 34 ⼀洀 in. (138 × 88 cm). Pinacoteca Municipal Ignacio Copyright © 2023 by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Merino, Municipalidad de Lima, Peru. Inside back: detail of New York stirrup-spout bottle with confronting figures, Moche, North Coast, Peru, 500–800 ce (fig. 24). Page 4: detail of stirrup-spout The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin (ISSN 0026-1521) bottle with owl, Moche, North Coast, Peru, 200–500 ce (fig. 4). is published quarterly by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Photographs of works in The Met collection are by Paul 1000 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10028-0198. Periodicals Lachenauer, Imaging Department, The Metropolitan Museum of postage paid at New York NY and additional mailing o昀케ces. Art, unless otherwise noted. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Membership Department, The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, 1000 Additional photography credits: all photography of works in Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10028-0198. Four weeks’ notice The Met collection © Metropolitan Museum of Art unless required for change of address. The Bulletin is provided as a otherwise noted; fig. 1: courtesy Douglas Sharon; fig. 2: image benefit to Museum members and is available by subscription. © Metropolitan Museum of Art; fig. 8: © Proyecto Arqueológico Subscriptions $30.00 a year. Back issues available on microfilm Huacas de Moche; fig. 43: image © Metropolitan Museum of Art, from National Archive Publishing Company, 300 N. Zeeb Road, photo by Richard Lee; fig. 44: photo © President and Fellows of Ann Arbor, MI 48106. Volumes I–XXXVII (1905–42) available Harvard College; fig. 45: photo by Pernille Klemp; fig. 46: © Juan as a clothbound reprint set or as individual yearly volumes from Javier Salazar. Ayer Company Publishers, Suite B-213, 400 Bedford Street, The Metropolitan Museum of Art endeavors to respect copy- Manchester, NH 03101, or from the Metropolitan Museum, right in a manner consistent with its nonprofit educational 66–26 Metropolitan Avenue, Middle Village, NY 11381-0001. mission. If you believe any material has been included in this Published by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York publication improperly, please contact the Publications and Mark Polizzotti, Publisher and Editor in Chief Editorial Department. Peter Antony, Associate Publisher for Production All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be repro- Michael Sittenfeld, Associate Publisher for Editorial duced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or Editor of the Bulletin: Dale Tucker mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any informa- Production by Christina Grillo tion storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing Designed by Gina Rossi from the publishers. Bibliographic editing by Penny Jones The Metropolitan Museum of Art Image acquisitions and permissions by Elizabeth De Mase 1000 Fifth Avenue Map by Adrian Kitzinger New York, New York 10028 Typeset in Verlag and Mercury metmuseum.org Separations by Professional Graphics, Inc., Rockford, Illinois Printed and bound by GHP Media, Inc., West Haven, Connecticut ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This Bulletin is based on research that benefited greatly from of this Bulletin. Additional thanks are owed to Lisa Altshuler, conversations with colleagues in the United States and Peru, Peter Antony, Lin Sen Chai, Amanda Chau, Elizabeth De Mase, including Sergio Barraza, Christopher Donnan, Edward S. Christina Grillo, Penny Jones, Teresa Jimenez-Millas, Adrian Harwood, Ulla Holmquist Pacchas, Christian Kleinbub, Natalia Kitzinger, Mandy Kritzeck, Matt Noiseux, David Rhoads, Gina Majluf, Luis Millones Santagadea, Ana de Orbegoso, Daniel Rossi, Chantal Stein, Ahmed Tarek, and Alison Tretter. For its Ri昀欀in, Douglas Sharon, and Lisa Trever. The authors wish support of the quarterly Bulletin program in part, we thank the to thank Paul Lachenauer for his elegant photographs of the Lila Acheson Wallace Fund for The Metropolitan Museum of works and Dale Tucker for his sterling work on the preparation Art, established by the cofounder of Reader’s Digest. 2

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DIRECTOR’S NOTE Pottery is one of the world’s most ancient and widespread reflect on devotional practices and interactions with technologies. While clay vessels can be found throughout divine power as well as occasionally arresting (perhaps the archaeological record, in certain times and places even perplexing or humorous) moments, such as when pottery took on an extraordinarily important role as a visitors first encounter vessels in the shape of seemingly primary bearer of meaning. In ancient Peru, for exam- violent root vegetables. ple, a region where writing as we understand it was not The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing will reopen in 2025 practiced, ceramic vessels became the expressive medium after an extensive reenvisioning, some 150 years after the par excellence, essential for both ritual practice and the first ancient Peruvian vessels entered The Met collection. exchange of ideas. The evocative works featured in this The Museum’s interest in this field waxed, waned, and Bulletin explore some 2,500 years of creative exploration then waxed again over the course of its history, ultimately in the Andes, taking a close look at remarkably imag- becoming, arguably, the finest comprehensive collection inative works that served as conduits to worldly and of ceramics outside Peru. Hugo C. Ikehara-Tsukayama divine power. and Joanne Pillsbury were joined by their colleague Dawn This Bulletin was prepared in concert with Containing Kriss, Associate Conservator, Department of Objects the Divine, a display of forty sacred vessels from the Conservation, as authors of this Bulletin, and I am grateful Andes and Indonesia on The Met’s Great Hall Balcony to them for deepening our understanding of these works from May 25, 2022, to September 29, 2023. The tempo- not only in terms of their formal interest and as part of a rary closure of The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing, where broader contextualized past, but also as objects that have these works normally reside, made possible this striking continued cultural relevance and meaning today. I also juxtaposition with other vessels from across Asia, expand- want to acknowledge and thank Alisa LaGamma, Ceil and ing and enhancing our understanding of the formal and Michael E. Pulitzer Curator in Charge of The Michael conceptual relationships of ritual objects. The installa- C. Rockefeller Wing, for her support of this project. tion and the accompanying Bulletin were informed in The quarterly Bulletin series is made possible in part by part by conversations and collaborations with colleagues the Lila Acheson Wallace Fund for The Metropolitan from around the globe, allowing us to reconsider this Museum of Art, established by the cofounder of area of The Met collection in new ways. Organized by Reader’s Digest. Maia Nuku, Evelyn A. J. Hall and John A. Friede Curator for Oceanic Art, Hugo C. Ikehara-Tsukayama, Senior Max Hollein Research Associate, and Joanne Pillsbury, Andrall E. Marina Kellen French Director Pearson Curator, all of The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing, The Metropolitan Museum of Art Containing the Divine provides rich opportunities to 3

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n 1987, Victor Flores Capuñay, a curandero (traditional healer) from Trujillo, Peru, placed nine ancient ceram- ics and six stone figurines on a mesa—an assemblage of Iritual objects—in order to cure his patient’s “soul loss,” or “bad-air ailments.” These disorders were believed to be caused by powerful huacas, referring to the ancient ruins 1 that dot the landscape of Peru’s North Coast (fig. 1). The ancient objects joined a diverse group of shells, swords, and crosses, as well as other items of recent manufac- ture, which Flores Capuñay carefully arranged to har- ness the power of gentiles (pagan ancestors), nature, and Christianity to help him fight maladies, promote good fortune, and combat the work of other sorcerers. These rituals, performed as battles between the healer and forces of evil, continue today in Peru, challenging contem- porary notions about the stark division between past and present and reminding us how ancient and modern beliefs intersect in sometimes unexpected ways. In Andean communities today, ceramic vessels gathered from huacas or passed down through families are considered to be active agents or entities that have substantial power. Pots found at archaeological sites, for example, can be held responsible for causing illness; in one case, a curandero identified a certain pot as the source of 2 a huaquero’s (looter’s) malady. The vessel was initially in demand by curanderos, who wanted the pot to help them in their mesas, but they soon discovered that it was too strong—or too evil—to be controlled. To avoid more harm, the huaquero was forced to return the pot to its huaca and offer a guinea pig sacrifice to avoid losing his life. The practice of removing goods from burial sites in Peru is not a recent phenomenon; indeed, it can be traced to Indigenous pre-conquest times.3 Tomb looting acceler- ated in the colonial era, however, largely with the purpose of extracting ornaments of gold and silver, and then wid- ened in the late eighteenth century to include ceramics as both individuals and institutions sought to meet a desire to understand an ancient past: part of a broader impulse during the Enlightenment and beyond to reveal and contextualize human origins. Looting continued in later centuries, driven by different factors, including the rise of the art market in the last 150 years. These practices dev- 4 astated thousands of ancient sites across Peru and in the

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1. Mesa assembled by healer Victor Flores Capuñay, 1987 process erased the archaeological context of the works particularly ancient ones, are often viewed as passive they contained, limiting a broader understanding of pots objects. Functional and utilitarian, they are sometimes linked to a specific place and time. seen as the less glamorous cousins of monumental stone Looting is also the primary means by which healers sculpture and gold regalia and are thus overlooked as source antiquities for their mesas, and both curanderos and bearers of meaning. Their ubiquity has also worked traditional huaqueros (individuals or families engaged in against them in terms of aesthetic appreciation. Yet small-scale extractions) exist in a world where archaeolog- in ancient Peru, pottery was very much considered a ical sites are considered powerful huacas and the pottery primary “canvas” for the expression of ideas and, more found in them, often referred to as huacos, are valued out- important, the activation of divine power. Literally of 4 side the discourse of cultural heritage or the art market. the earth, ceramics connect communities, both now These huaqueros operate at the margins of legality, but the and in the past, with an animate landscape, the realm practice is seen as accessing an inheritance left by their of the ancestors. In antiquity, ceramic vessels acquired ancestors: one that they can beseech for help in supporting their vital potency in the hands of their creators, which their families. The huaquero’s actions imply a relationship was further strengthened through use in ritual practice. with an enlivened entity (the archaeological site), and his Today, these vessels achieve transformative strength or her success depends on the willingness of the huaca through their connection to a distant past and, especially, to give its treasures away or, instead, to cause harm, even to their source, the huacas themselves, the tangible leg- “eating” the huaqueros alive. acy of the vibrant religious centers that once populated Beyond the communities in which such objects are the Peruvian landscape. consigned meaning and power, these ceramic vessels, 5

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2. Gourd-shaped bottle. Topará; Peru, 200 bce– 100 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 5 ⼀最 in. (14.6 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Nathan Cummings, 1963 (63.232.55) Ancient Peruvian Pots gourds (Lagenaria siceraria), and the first ceramics in Four thousand years ago, artists in the Andean region of Peru, including bottles, were shaped in ways that resem- South America began transforming clay, a readily avail- ble gourds, a style that continued for hundreds of years, able material, into vessels. These works ranged from sim- often alongside more inventive forms (fig. 2). Pottery, as ple pots for everyday tasks to elaborate bottles for ritual an innovation, provided greater flexibility than its botan- use. Delicately modeled and decorated, such containers ical counterpart in both form and function. The high were a means of connecting with divine powers, but they plasticity of clay permits an infinite array of shaping pos- were also essential to the public feasts that were held to sibilities, and once exposed to intense heat through firing, establish and strengthen communities. What the vessels it transforms into ceramic, a durable and robust material were meant to hold, and how to interpret their complex that can withstand the rigors of everyday use.5 imagery, is still largely unknown. There was no tradition Once the technology was adopted, ceramics quickly of writing in South America before the sixteenth cen- became a primary medium for the expression and cir- tury, when Spanish script replaced established methods culation of ideas. Expanding upon the relatively simple of recording information, such as the complex, knotted shapes of the gourd, Andean potters created a broad cords known as khipu. The depictions of supernatural repertoire of styles, which served multiple purposes and beings, animals, and people, however, reveal aspects of reflected a multitude of cultural traditions that developed religious traditions that thrived for thousands of years and faded through time. The Met’s collection of ancient before the rise of the Inca Empire in the fifteenth century. Peruvian pottery primarily features works from the These pots once held physical substances, but they also coast, a striking desert landscape where, under normal contained—and indeed still embody—ancient Andean conditions, little or no rain falls outside the periodic, and concepts of imitation, transformation, power, and cosmo- occasionally catastrophic, El Niño events (fig. 3). The logical knowledge. Peruvian coastal desert is bisected by rivers, however, Ceramics developed in South America relatively late which bring life-giving waters from the Andes moun- compared to rock art and textiles, which predate pottery tains to sustain communities of varying scales, from by thousands of years. Prior to the introduction of ceram- villages to cities. Potters in these settlements created an 6 ics in the second millennium ce, vessels were made from array of ceramic objects, from figurines to architectural

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Piura ra iu P Chachapoyas N O Chiclayo Chancay R equetepequ Cajamarca J e Tembladera T icama h M H U C c H che ara uall aya Mo ñón aga li Trujillo Huaca de la Luna Amazon Basin C Santa Calle jón O epeña de N Hu Cerro Blanco a A yla Casma Huaráz s Chavín de Huántar S P T za le rta a o F c ativilca a P e ological Site or Ar chae Ar odern City M i f uaura MILES H A 0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 i 0 25 50 75 100 125 150 175 200 225 250 c ón KILOMETERS ill N Ch Atlantic O c LIMA ala D Oce M an e a n E Wari azon Ayacucho Am S S Pisco Paracas Peninsula a O Ica Ic Lima U ande Cusco T r G L. Titicaca ío N a H R azc ArequipaPuno L Cahuachi P AREA OF as Trancas rí a MAIN MAP C Aca auca ci Y f i c O O A MILES cea 0 160 n S 0 250 ETERS T KILOM 3. Map of Peru with archaeological sites and regions discussed in this Bulletin 7

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a limited palette: generally either the color of the clay body itself, which they altered through firing, or a bichromatic approach of red and cream. Potters on the South Coast demonstrated a greater interest in polychromy, painting their vessels with a range of colors, including orange, red, purple, and yellow. The imagery can be complex, and it remains poorly understood. On one example, a flying figure holds a staff or axe, its face partially obscured by an elaborate nose ornament evoking a feline’s whiskers, but without contemporary texts it is di昀케cult to know with certainty who or what is depicted (fig. 5). North and south were also divided by a predilection for specific spouts and handles, a taste that was as endur- ing as it was distinct (fig. 6). So-called stirrup-spout bottles—named in modern times after the spout’s resem- blance to a riding saddle stirrup—first developed in what is now Ecuador, were adopted by potters on Peru’s North Coast around 1200 bce, and remained the most recogniz- able vessel type in this region for the next 2,700 years. On the South Coast, potters favored a different type of bottle, one that generally has either a single spout with a strap handle or two spouts connected by a bridge. Initially created by Paracas potters on the South Coast during the first millennium BCE, the spout-and-bridge bottle and its variants reached the Central Coast in the following 4. Stirrup-spout bottle with owl. Moche; North Coast, Peru, 200–500 ce. centuries and finally spread to other parts of the Central Ceramic and slip, H. 9 ⼀挀 in. (24.1 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Andes along with the expanding Wari Empire between New York; Gift of Nathan Cummings, 1966 (66.30.5) 600 and 900 ce. In some ways, such bottles are impractical—they are ornaments, but most production was dedicated to con- di昀케cult to fill and empty—implying that their use was tainers for food and drink. The greatest artistic attention restricted or otherwise limited to certain events. Some, was lavished on serving vessels such as bottles, bowls, such as Nasca spout-and-bridge bottles, made in the plates, and cups: fancier versions of more utilitarian first centuries of the Common Era on the South Coast, 6 ceramics. Potters also created specialized ritual vessels, seem to have been used exclusively in funerary contexts. including bottles with unusual spouts. Occasionally Similarly, on the North Coast, stirrup-spout bottles were depicted in ceremonial scenes painted on vessels, these closely associated with ritual practice, judging from the bottles were the focus of some of the most creative and depictions of them on other vessels (see, for example, inventive imagery known from the ancient Americas. fig. 38). The stirrup spout likely provided a useful handle, While such vessels are easily broken, their sherds but its primary appeal may have been symbolic. By manip- endure, leaving us with a persistent record in a way that ulating the flow of liquids, the spout could have repre- other, more fragile organic materials such as textiles do sented the circulation of water from rain to lakes, rivers, not. We know from studying such vessels that Andean plants, and, ultimately, people. The water cycle may have communities had clear preferences for certain shapes, col- been an organizing principle that aided Andean commu- ors, and themes, for example, and because of these choices nities in understanding the complexity of the world and modern archaeologists have viewed ceramics as a reliable their place within it. indicator of cultural identities, and changes within them, Some vessels were, for reasons still unknown, over time. On Peru’s North Coast, potters excelled at cre- intentionally broken before being deposited in burials; ating bottles modeled in the shapes of animals, vegetables, other pots were smashed and buried in caches, perhaps 8 and human or supernatural figures (fig. 4). They preferred as offerings. In contrast, some vessels show evidence

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5. Double-spout bottle with flying figure. Nasca; South Coast, Peru, 300–500 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 6 ⼀最 in. (17.1 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Purchase, Arthur M. Bullowa Bequest, 1996 (1996.174) 9

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ECUADOR NORTH CENTRAL SOUTH CENTRAL COAST PERU COAST PERU COAST PERU HIGHLANDS PERU 1500 CHIMU-INCA CHIMU CHINCHA 1000 COASTAL LAMBAYEQUE WARI WARI LATE MOCHE LIMA 500 BAHÍA NASCA VICÚS EARLY MOCHE RECUAY BCE/CE TOPARÁ VIRÚ / GALLINAZO VILLA EL SALVADOR SALINAR PARACAS 500 CHAVÍN 1000 CHORRERA CUPISNIQUE 1500 MACHALILLA 2000 CHINCHIPE-MARAÑÓN 6. Diagram of main bottle forms from Peru and Ecuador before the sixteenth century 10

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7. Neckless jar with complex scene. Paracas; South Coast, Peru, 350 bce–60 ce. Ceramic and post-fire paint, H. 12 1/16 in. (30.6 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Bequest of Nelson A. Rockefeller, 1979 (1979.206.741) of repair, suggesting that they were highly valued and sel with a broken spout, for example, was likely created used over a long period of time. Pairs of holes would be more than 100 kilometers from the location of its final carefully placed on either side of a crack, presumably to deposit at Huaca de la Luna, in the Moche Valley. In some reinforce their walls with twine (fig. 7, with repair holes cases, burials may have been only the most recent context 7 visible in left half). In other cases, a broken spout was for these objects before they were excavated hundreds 8 secured to the body of the vessel, also with twine (fig. 8). of years later, when they continued their “social lives” in These repairs speak to the long use-lives of these objects, communities and museums, taking on new roles and new but also to the distances they traveled over time. The ves- meanings along the way. 11

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strictor). Fierce, strong, and agile, these animals are cunning hunters that use surprise attacks to catch their prey. Two San Pedro cacti, known for their hallucinogenic properties, are modeled on either side of the vessel. Ritual participants who ingested a beverage made from the cacti might have perceived themselves transforming into a jaguar or a snake, and thereby perhaps subsuming some of their desirable attributes. The remarkable details on such vessels were clearly meant to be observed at close range, at least by some beholders. Four zoomorphic heads lightly incised in profile on the shoulder further amplify the ves- sel’s message of power and predation. Artists often rendered these felines in imaginative ways, sometimes reducing the composition to the crea- ture’s most noticeable features. On one simple bottle with textured grooved lines, a smooth mouth emerges: a fang, seen in profile, that is doubled and mirrored to become part of a powerful maw seen from the front (fig. 11). These vessels, associated with the cultures known today as Chavín and Cupisnique, were used in large gatherings 8. Moche bottle (with repaired neck and handle) from Huaca del Sol, La Libertad, Peru Emerging Styles on the North Coast The earliest Andean potters relied on techniques that remain elemental to the technical repertoire of any ceramic artist today. Through coiling (placing rolls of clay on top of one another) and careful hand-modeling (using one’s fingers or tools to shape vessel walls), these potters created a wide array of objects, from cooking and storage vessels to elaborate ceramic sculptures. Early potters emphasized the contrast between textured and polished surfaces in their ceramics, suggesting that these works were intended to provide both a visual and a tactile experience (fig. 9). In comparison with later firing technologies, the kilns and open firepits used during this period were less e昀케cient, frequently producing surfaces with hues of dark browns, grays, and blacks owing to the high content of carbonized material in their paste and fire clouds (darker patches on the surface resulting from something touching the vessel during firing). Some very fine graywares and red-slipped vessels are exceptions that would have required improved firing technology. Predatory animals such as felines were a favored subject in early Andean ceramics. This grayware vessel 9. Stirrup-spout bottle. Cupisnique; Peru, 800–500 bce. Ceramic, H. 9 ⼀洀 (fig. 10) depicts an otorongo (jaguar), a powerful feline in. (24.4 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Gift of Nelson A. Rockefeller, 1969 12 from the Amazon rainforest, and a macanche (boa con- (1978.412.40)

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10. Stirrup-spout bottle with feline and snake. Cupisnique; Peru, 1200–800 bce. Ceramic, H. 9 ⼀挀 in. (24.1 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Harris Brisbane Dick and Fletcher Funds, 1967 (67.239.17) 13

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The combination of modeling, incision, burnishing, and combing used on some vessels resulted in striking compositions that appear entirely abstract to modern eyes, but the designs on others are engagingly direct, such as a bottle depicting a three-dimensional mouse whose tail, rendered in low relief, extends to the edge of the vessel’s shoulder (fig. 13). The combination of the high sheen of the burnished sections such as the spout with the robustly textured surfaces creates a dynamic formal contrast that animates the composition. Muted, matte tones of gray, black, and tan were more common in early ceramics—as noted above, the color typically derived from the hue of the clay body itself—but occasionally potters applied polychrome pigments, such as vibrant reds, after firing to create a more dramatic visual effect. One tall bottle said to be from Tembladera, in the Jequetepeque Valley, has well-preserved surface paint (fig. 14). The head of a composite, supernatural creature with feline, bird, and caimanlike features is rendered snout up, with a curl- ing tongue that emerges from the fanged mouth. To the right of the eye, a flange on the side of the vessel details 11. Bottle with fang motif. Cupisnique; Peru, 800–500 bce. Ceramic, H. 7 in. (17.8 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Judith Riklis, 1983 (1983.546.12) at monumental ceremonial centers; some were smashed and discarded, while others were reused before they were 9 eventually deposited in burials. Either way, the objects were removed from circulation, prompting a need for further production, displays of chiefly hospitality, and 10 opportunities for creative exploration. Early Andean ceramics vary in quality, and some clearly received greater attention in their manufacture, suggesting that they were destined for a specific use or specialized role. A vessel in the shape of a feline, for example, was carefully polished, and then small circles were engraved on the sur- face, perhaps in emulation of the spots on a creature’s pelt (fig. 12). Such fine works may have served as gifts or been 12. Feline-shaped stirrup-spout bottle. Cupisnique; North Coast, displayed prominently in rituals, where the iconography Peru, 1200–800 bce. Ceramic, H. 9 ⼀椀 in. (23.2 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial 14 perhaps signaled rank and authority. Collection, Purchase, Nelson A. Rockefeller Gift, 1968 (1978.412.217)

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13. Stirrup-spout bottle with mouse. Cupisnique; Peru, 800–500 bce. Ceramic, H. 8 in. (20.3 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Louis Slavitz, 1988 (1988.277) 15

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14. Bottle with caiman (front and back). Cupisnique; Tembladera, Peru, 1000–800 bce. Ceramic and post-fire paint, H. 12 ⼀最 in. (32.4 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Purchase, Nelson A. Rockefeller Gift, 1967 (1978.412.203) a vertebral crest terminating in a feline head. The back perspective, the monkey’s legs become the snake’s body, of the vessel features another vertical, abstract pattern and the circular spots evoke the pattern of a predator, the that perhaps represents a spinal column with feathers or macanche. The monkey’s head is tilted because it has been scutes, the bony plates found on alligators, crocodiles, and ensnared amid the snake’s coils. By rotating the bottle, caimans (fig. 14). the viewer observes two animals in opposite and comple- The malleability of clay allows for considerable explo- mentary perspectives, both formally and conceptually. ration of three-dimensional form, and ancient Peruvian The potter gave the monkey, a diurnal animal—and here potters experimented with shapes and surface decoration, the prey—a red, modeled body with black features, such often combining the two in order to subtly evoke multiple as its face. In contrast, the snake, a nocturnal predator, is creatures in a single vessel, subverting simple readings of rendered two-dimensionally in black slip with red body the sculptural form. A stirrup-spout bottle that outwardly markings. Predator and prey, opposing forces, are thus appears to represent a seated monkey, its legs in low relief inventively united. and its head cocked to one side, is revealed to be a more complicated composition when held and rotated (fig. 15). South Coast The other side of the vessel reveals a lightly incised Artists explored color more thoroughly on Peru’s South stylized animal head, shown in profile, with a snake-like Coast. On early vessels, such as those made by artists on 16 tongue that extends toward the monkey’s head. From this the Paracas Peninsula in the first millennium bce, paints

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were applied after the vessel was fired. Hundreds of cized into a series of parallel, incised lines that were then years later, ceramicists developed methods to incorporate filled with color. In one bottle (fig. 17), bands that form the pigments before firing a vessel, achieving a more durable elegantly curved eyes and brows meet at the center of the result. Paracas potters created spout-and-bridge vessels, face at a small nose sculpted in relief. Two small, upright for example, by incising designs in the clay before firing ears and a menacing mouth revealing crossed upper and and then, after firing, applying paints frequently made lower canines complete the stylized visage, which appears 11 with powdered minerals and organic binders (fig. 16). just below a spout with a modeled bird head that func- The resulting delicate surfaces imply that these bottles tions as a whistle. were not for everyday use. With the body of the ceramic Descendants of the Paracas tradition, Nasca artists fired to black and dark brown tones in a reducing atmo- developed bottles with colorful, durable surfaces capable sphere—one in which oxygen is limited, creating smoky, of withstanding greater use. Potters applied slips (mix- smudging conditions—the post-fire white, red, orange, tures of clay and water, with minerals added for color) yellow, green, and blue colors appear particularly vivid. before firing. Because mineral slips change color under Early Paracas artists borrowed imagery from their high temperatures—and mastering the creation of a northern neighbors, including that of highly stylized, smooth slip surface with the expansion and contraction almost abstract felines. A cat’s features could be geometri- of the ceramic under the extreme heat of firing presents 15. Stirrup-spout bottle with monkey and snake (front and back). Cupisnique; Peru, 1200–800 bce. Ceramic and slip, H. 11 ⼀挀 in. (29.2 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Harris Brisbane Dick and Fletcher Funds, 1967 (67.239.6) 17

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16. Feline-shaped spout-and-bridge vessel (side and back). Paracas; Ica Valley, Peru, 800–400 bce. Ceramic and post-fire paint, H. 6 ⼀漀 in. (17.5 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Bequest of Nelson A. Rockefeller, 1979 (1979.206.1148) 18

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17. Spout-and-bridge bottle with feline face. Paracas; Ica Valley, Peru, 800–550 bce. Ceramic and post-fire paint, H. 7 in. (17.8 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Nathan Cummings, 1962 (62.266.72) 19

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18. Double-spout bottle with shark (front and back). Nasca; South Coast, Peru, 1–400 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 6 ⼀最 in. (17.1 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Nathan Cummings, 1964 (64.228.70) an immense technical challenge—this innovation would bodied head in its hand, its reddened mouth revealing have required intensive experimentation over the course teeth with red dots, suggesting drops of blood. What of many generations. is the meaning of the two depictions? Are we meant to The Nasca region is well known for the spectacu- see these as two moments in time, a before and a bloody lar geoglyphs etched into the desert landscape, and in after? Themes of conflict and predation, if that is what recent years archaeological excavations have revealed the these are, abound on other examples, such as a small remains of habitations and large ritual centers as well. bowl with an enigmatic scene of large raptorial birds Specialized workshops near these ritual centers produced decapitating human beings (fig. 19). The white back- finely slip-painted ceramics, which were also made in ground is filled with spears, heads, and circular objects domestic settings, telling us that such fineware was not that could be sling stones: projectiles hurled to soften an limited to those of elite status. Large ritual centers such enemy force in battle. as Cahuachi may have been places of pilgrimage and thus The Nasca style dominated ceramic production on were occupied only periodically. Following festivities the South Coast until 650 ce, when the Wari Empire—an there, vessels would have been distributed, and partici- expansive state, centered in the Andean mountains, that pants would thus have returned home bearing objects of once controlled a large portion of what is now Peru—began prestige and religious knowledge. to influence the coastal region. The Wari heartland, in Early Nasca vessels often feature a single image such Ayacucho, is geographically close to the Nasca pampas, as a bird, plant, or fish—either on its own or repeated and Wari potters quickly adopted the palette and ceramic several times across the sides of a pot—outlined in black technology developed by Nasca artists. Coastal artists against a creamy-white background. Spout-and-bridge themselves articulated a hybrid style, combining imperial bottles sometimes have a pair of these animals, one on Wari iconography with local pottery traditions. One such each side of the vessel. On one example, a lively, anthro- bottle features a modeled feline head, characteristic of the pomorphized shark swims along, empty-handed (fig. 18). Andean highlands, with the colorful slip style developed on 20 On the other side of the vessel, the shark grasps a disem- the coast by earlier Nasca potters (fig. 20). Painted on the

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19. Bowl (front and detail of back). Nasca; Peru, 1–400 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 3 ⼀欀 in. (8.6 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Purchase, Nelson A. Rockefeller Gift, 1961 (1978.412.63) 21

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20. Bottle in the shape of a feline. Wari; Peru, 600–900 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 8 in. (20.3 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Purchase, 22 Arthur M. Bullowa Bequest and Rogers Fund, 1996 (1996.290)

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in the south, to perhaps as far north as the Piura River, near the present-day border between Peru and Ecuador. They did so by developing coastal deserts into rich farmlands and by drawing upon the abundant maritime resources of the Pacific Ocean’s Humboldt Current. Although the precise nature of Moche political organiza- tion is a subject of debate, these centers, and the monu- mental earthen platforms associated with them, shared unifying cultural traits such as religious practices. Prolific and inventive, Moche potters created a strik- ing new style on the North Coast during the first centuries ce. While their early vessels portray animals and humans with considerable fidelity (see fig. 4), later examples fea- ture one or more animals fused with the bodies of warriors in compositions that dissolve the boundaries between species. A vessel in the shape of a warrior on bended knee, 21. Double-chambered bottle. Wari; Central Coast, Peru, 800–900 ce. for example, shows him holding a shield and a war club Ceramic and slip, H. 5 ⼀洀 in. (14.3 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and wearing a crescent headdress with two circular pro- New York; Gift of Nathan Cummings, 1967 (67.167.35) trusions: the standard attire of a Moche warrior (fig. 22). But the face of the warrior is clearly that of a hawk with no flasklike body of the vessel, the feline’s claws grasp another animal, perhaps a reference to imperial reach and power. The impact of the expansion of the Wari Empire was particularly noticeable in the sudden mixing of previously distinct regional styles, suggesting increased interactions and exchange among populations. Bottle shapes such as the spout-and-bridge type, once largely confined to the South Coast, were now being created elsewhere, while other types usually associated with the North Coast, such as the double-chambered vessel, were found along the entire coast. An example of the latter features a bottle on one side and a dignitary on a stepped platform on the other; a chevron pattern, a characteristic Wari motif, decorates the handle (fig. 21). The dignitary wears a four-cornered hat typically worn by high-status Wari men. He holds a Spondylus shell—the casing of an imported tropical bivalve that was perhaps the most highly valued material in the ancient Andes—further underscoring his elite status. Yet the vessel itself, particu- larly in its relatively simple painting style, pales in quality compared to those from the Ayacucho heartland. Also a whistling vessel (the mechanism is located in the open mouth), it is a work that speaks to a desire to emulate and appropriate the styles and symbols of power. Desert Kingdoms of the North 22. Stirrup-spout bottle with warrior. Moche; North Coast, Peru, Over the course of some six centuries, the Moche built 500–800 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 10 ⼀攀 in. (26 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Nathan Cummings, 1963 (63.226.8) thriving regional centers from the Huarmey River Valley, 23

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23. Stirrup-spout bottle with fox warriors (front and lateral view). Moche; North Coast, Peru, 500–800 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 11 ⼀最 in. (29.8 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Henry G. Marquand, 1882 (82.1.29) suggestion that the figure represents a human in a hawk facilitated an increase in production, and workshops near costume. On another vessel, two warriors, one painted ritual centers expanded, facilitating the development and 12 on either side, run swiftly through a desert landscape, distribution of fine ceramics. The vessel bodies were indicated by a wavy ground line and cactus plants (fig. 23). shaped by two-piece molds, and then the stirrup-spouts, 13 Here the warriors’ faces and tails are those of foxes, keen formed with the help of wooden rods, were attached. hunters known for their speed and cunning, while the The introduction of molds did not, however, diminish the warriors’ regalia is carefully detailed, down to the pat- degree of variation or creative expression in such vessels, terns of their tunics. Are we to understand these figures as Moche potters finished mold-made works in different as supernatural beings or mythological heroes? Or do they ways, such as modeling and painting distinct headdresses, symbolically represent distinct classes of Moche warriors, ear ornaments, and other details, so that no two are with the selection of animal reflecting their prowess in exactly alike. hunting? While these questions cannot be answered with The bottle with the fox warriors was painted in a certainty, in Moche ceramics it seems clear that animals style known as fineline, developed by Moche artists to were not part of a natural world to be dominated but, depict myriad aspects of life in increasing detail over the rather, were beings to emulate and whose abilities—flying, course of their history.14 The first examples in the style swimming, hunting—were desired. were relatively simple, often featuring a single figure Early Moche bottles were made by coiling clay to executed in a reddish-brown slip, which was applied build up the vessel, but eventually the use of molds, with delicate brushes made of human or animal hair 24 which was more expeditious, became widespread. Molds over a creamy-white background. The surface was then

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burnished before firing, likely with stone or bone polish- engages in lively conversation with an anthropomor- ers. The contrast between the mechanical reproduction phized iguana wearing a bird headdress (fig. 24). The of these bottles and the elaborate nature of the painting figure raises his index finger to the iguana, who responds style raises the question of whether the potter and the with joined, raised hands, as if in supplication. The pair is painter were the same person. Technical analysis on repeated on the other side of the vessel, although this time archaeologically recovered bottles indicates that they the figure has prominent wrinkles, perhaps suggesting the were made using local raw materials; thus, the existence passage of time (see also inside back cover). The iguana of stylistically similar depictions in different valleys could and “Wrinkle Face” (as he has come to be known) are 15 have involved artists traveling between communities. depicted frequently in Moche ceramics, and the scenes Based on an archive built during decades of research, we see on vessels may represent specific moments in the 17 archaeologist Christopher Donnan and his colleague complex sagas of culture heroes. These lively characters Donna McClelland have identified dozens of possible remind us that a rich mythology surely once accompanied 16 individual artists or groups of artists. these objects, and that their stories—perhaps linked to an Fineline painting became more complex after 500 oral tradition that may have been part and parcel of the ce and began to incorporate compositions that suggest act of viewing these vessels—were revealed as observers specific narratives. On one vessel, a figure with prominent slowly turned them in their hands. fangs who is shown wearing a feline headdress, snake It is tempting to see different vessels as represent- earspools, and a snake-headed belt sits on a throne and ing different scenes from a common myth. For example, 24. Stirrup-spout bottle with confronting figures (front and back). Moche; North Coast, Peru, 500–800 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 9 in. (22.9 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Purchase, Nelson A. Rockefeller Gift, 1961 (1978.412.70) 25

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25. Stirrup-spout bottle with decapitation scene. Moche; North Coast, Peru, 200–500 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 7 ⼀挀 in. (19.1 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Bequest of Jane Costello Goldberg, from the Collection of Arnold I. Goldberg, 1986 (1987.394.630) 26

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on one bottle, a three-dimensional standing figure has performed as battles between a curandero and malevo- 18 the deep wrinkles, fanged mouth, feline headdress, lent forces? Or are the frequent oppositional pairings and snake-headed belt seen in other representations in ancient Peruvian ceramics about capturing dramatic of Wrinkle Face (fig. 25). Often shown in sacrifice moments that distill existential or cosmic struggles? and combat scenes, he is seen here holding a tumi (a In the centuries after the fall of the Moche civiliza- crescent-bladed sacrificial knife) in his left hand, and with tion, the Chimú kingdom rose and conquered most of the his right hand he appears to be tossing back an open- Pacific coast from present-day Ecuador to the modern mouthed fish head, presumably just removed from the Peruvian capital of Lima. By this time, the use of molds body that now lies in front of him on the platform (fig. 26). was widespread across the Andes, and potters produced A second vessel, a blackware stirrup-spout bottle—the large quantities of vessels, resulting in a certain stylistic bottle’s limited chamber is entirely perfunctory, serving homogeneity. Gray-black ceramics fired in a reducing here largely as a platform for the dramatic action—seems atmosphere became the signature ware of the Chimú. to present a reversal of fortune, as Wrinkle Face is supine Little attention was paid to the forms after they were on the platform and struggles for control of a war club removed from the molds beyond a careful burnishing of with a fishlike creature shown leaning over him (fig. 27). the surface, often resulting in a high gloss that resembles Should we view these combat scenes through the lens the sheen of silver, which by this period had become, of the contemporary healing practices described above, along with other precious metals, the prestige medium 26. Detail of stirrup-spout bottle with decapitation scene (fig. 25) 27

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27. Stirrup-spout bottle with combat scene. Moche; North Coast, Peru, 200–500 ce. Ceramic, H. 4 ⼀挀 in. (11.4 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Bequest of Nelson A. Rockefeller, 1979 (1979.206.412) 19 for aesthetic expression. Yet there may have been other rival kingdoms such as the Chimú in a little over a cen- reasons for a rejection of earlier styles such as fineline tury. The Inca, who called their empire Tahuantinsuyo— and polychromy. Chimú blackware may, for instance, “realm of the four parts”— imposed an imperial style in have been intentionally archaizing, harking back to the architecture, ceramics, and other arts to varying degrees muted palette and, occasionally, to the subject matter across their domain. Regional styles continued to flour- of Cupisnique vessels created some two thousand years ish, however, often with the adoption of Inca motifs and earlier (fig. 28). shapes, and within the Cusco heartland itself, Inca potters developed an elaborate fineware reserved for the Inca 20 Imperial Design ruler and his relatives. At the time of the Spanish conquest of Peru, in 1535, the Inca imperial ceramics are characterized by superb Inca Empire dominated much of western South America, craftsmanship and a limited repertoire of distinctive unifying the region via a network of some 25,000 miles shapes, including a bottle type known as an urpu in of roads. The largest in the ancient Americas, and at the Quechua, the modern language descended from that time one of the largest in the world, the Inca Empire came spoken by the Incas. These bottles have globular cham- 28 from humble beginnings in the Cusco region to vanquish bers, pointed bases (for ease of pouring), and tall necks

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28. Stirrup-spout bottle with feline. Chimú; North Coast, Peru, 1100–1470 ce. Ceramic, H. 11 ⼀攀 in. (28.6 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Nathan Cummings, 1964 (64.228.17) with a flared rim. Large urpus (up to 45 inches in height) llama neck and head. The second spout, in the shape of a were used for storage; they could be transported easily by bird neck and head, connects to the larger, outer bowl. A porters, who would run a rope through the handles and third animal, a spotted jaguar, lounges across the lip of the across the animal-head lug on the shoulder of the vessel. vessel and grips the rim with its paws. This structurally Smaller versions (fig. 29) served votive purposes at sacred complex, iconographically rich work was likely deployed sites across the empire. Most include panels of geometric in rituals designed to ensure the fertility of the lands. patterning delicately painted in polychrome slips, usually black and red on a cream-colored background. Containers of Substances Other Inca vessels are more idiosyncratic in shape Most fine ceramics from ancient Peru are containers— and conception. A small, shallow, slightly incurved bottles, jars, bowls, and other vessels—presumably libation bowl with three short supports and panels with designed to hold liquids or other materials. Traces of insects painted on the exterior merits close examination their contents, left behind in microscopic amounts in the (fig. 30). A second, smaller bowl, formed in the interior interiors of the vessels, are beginning to be analyzed and of the outer bowl, was pierced on the bottom, its cham- identified, revealing an array of substances that were once ber connected to a cream-colored spout in the shape of a present, including beer. Recent studies have brought to 29

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29. Small urpu (jar). Inca; Peru, 15th–early 16th century. Ceramic and slip, H. 8 ⼀洀 in. (21.9 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Nelson A. Rockefeller Gift, 1961 (1978.412.68) 30

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30. Double bowl (side and top). Inca; Peru, 15th–early 16th century. Ceramic and slip, H. 3 ⼀洀 in. (9.2 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Bequest of Nelson A. Rockefeller, 1979 (1979.206.1149) 31

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light various recipes for the beverage in use at the time, including beers with a range of ingredients, such as maize 21 (corn) and molle berries (Schinus molle). In the first mil- lennium bce, maize beer may have been a feature of cele- brations at sites such as Cerro Blanco, a major ceremonial center in the Nepeña Valley, but it was not the dominant tipple: beverages made from crops such as manioc were 22 also prevalent. After 500 bce, however, maize beer, known today as aqha or chicha, became the most impor- tant ceremonial drink in the Andes, and it has remained so in traditional communities. Vessels that may have held beer often celebrate corn imagery, such as a Nasca vessel that depicts the key components of a corn plant, from the roots to the cobs, without leaves or husks (fig. 31). A pair of Inca ritual ves- sels known as pacchas, created centuries later, combine the shapes of a foot plow, a cob, and an urpu into objects that neatly summarize the process of planting, harvest- 23 ing, and fermenting corn (fig. 32). Pacchas functioned as ritual watering devices: liquids would be poured into the top of the jar and would then flow through the foot plow into the earth, symbolically feeding it to ensure continued success in the agricultural cycle. Beer, essential for the maintenance of social cohesion, was a key component of ritual celebrations on both local and imperial scales. The imagery on ceramic vessels occa- sionally provides insight into such gatherings. A paccha from an earlier period, with a wide body, a flared neck on one side, and a spout on the other, presents a lively scene (fig. 33). Made by a Recuay potter in the Callejón de Huaylas, a valley in the Andean highlands, the vessel depicts seven small figures standing in front of a wall with a painted frieze; they surround a larger figure lying on its stomach. The larger figure, perhaps a curaca (lord) or ancestor, wears an elaborate crescent-shaped headdress, usually indicative of high or even supernatural status, and circular ear ornaments. Two individuals approach the large being and present a camelid, held on a lead. Five women flanking the being hold cups, reminding us that the exchange of liquids was at the heart of Andean ritual practice, crucial to the maintenance of social relations among members of a community but also between the community and ancestral power. Containers as Bodies Pots are often conceptually associated with people not 31. Corn stalk-shaped vessel. Nasca; South Coast, Peru, 1–600 ce. only within the field of archaeology, which views ceram- Ceramic and slip, H. 10 ⼀攀 in. (26 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, ics as being diagnostic of specific communities and cul- New York; Purchase, Judith S. Randal Foundation Gift, 1989 (1989.62.1) 32 tures, but also in the way we speak of clay vessels, such as

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32. Pair of pacchas (ritual vessels). Inca; Peru, 15th–16th century. Ceramic and slip, H. 8 ⼀攀 in. (21 cm); H. 8 9/16 in. (21.8 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Rogers Fund, 1986 (1986.383.1, .2) describing bottles as having necks, shoulders, and bodies. said to have ceramic “brothers” and “sisters,” including 25 In the ancient Andes, this relationship between pots and one named Coya Huarmi. Other vessels from the same 26 people was often made explicit, with vessels created as region were described as having faces. The tradition of e昀케gies or as models of persons, animals, or plants. Potters what archaeologists call “face-neck jars” extends back also created containers that were sometimes thought to at least 500 bce and continued through the time of either to be embodiments of vital powers or to be inhab- the Inca Empire (fig. 34). The capacious bodies of these ited by supernatural beings, blurring the boundaries that vessels, surmounted by detailed heads through which separate “things” from beings. liquids would presumably flow, provide rich potential for During the seventeenth-century campaigns that interpretation, as community members were believed to sought to eliminate Indigenous religious practices, partake of the bodies, and perhaps the life forces, of lead- Spanish colonial authorities described communities in ers and maybe even vanquished enemies through their the highlands of the province of Lima venerating small ritual use, as seen in one example fashioned as a prisoner jars (cantarillos) as the physical bodies of deified beings stripped of his loincloth and restrained by a rope around and offering them food and drink. A jar known as Coca the neck (fig. 35). Mama was dressed in an anacu (long tunic), lliclla (man- Vessels were also made in the shape of heads. Nasca 24 tle), belt, collar, and ear ornaments. Another vessel, jars boast elaborate headdresses, and the faces were known as Llanca Anaco, wore a camelid skin and was painted with wide-open eyes, eyebrows, and occasionally 33

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33. Vessel with ritual scene (front and back). Recuay; Ancash, Peru, 200–700 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 8 ⼀攀 in. (21 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Purchase, Nelson A. Rockefeller Gift, 1966 (1978.412.153) 34

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35

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34. Vessel with face-neck. Moche; North Coast, Peru, 200–800 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 12 ⼀椀 in. (30.8 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New 36 York; Museum Accession (X.2.222)

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mustaches and beards (fig. 36). Made near the site of Cahuachi, the most important ceremonial center of the South Coast in the first centuries ce, such contain- ers were used in the large feasts that brought together hundreds of people from communities both near and 27 far. Those who attended these gatherings returned home with vessels as testaments to their connection with powerful places and as bearers of religious meaning. As noted above, finely painted Nasca serving vessels have been found in the refuse of households from all levels of society, but head jars have been found only in the most a昀툀uent homes.28 Nasca head jars were also placed in the tombs of high-status individuals whose heads or whole bodies were removed, suggesting they could serve as 29 symbolic stand-ins for missing bodies or body parts. For a few centuries in the middle of the first mil- lennium ce, Moche artists excelled at creating “portrait vessels,” so called because their striking naturalism seems to reflect an attempt to evoke specific individ- uals (fig. 37). Using molds, Moche potters made mul- tiple versions of the same head, but with variations in 30 35. Prisoner jar. Moche; North Coast, Peru, 200–800 ce. Ceramic and details such as the ear ornaments. In some cases, it slip, H. 10 ⼀最 in. (27.3 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; is possible to recognize what appears to be the same Gift of Judith Riklis, 1983 (1983.546.6) 36. Head jars. Nasca; South Coast, Peru, 100–500 ce. Ceramic and slip. Left: H. 7 13/16 in. (19.8 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Purchase, Nelson A. Rockefeller Gift, 1961 (1978.412.61). Right: H. 8 in. (20.3 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Jack Davis Neal, 1970 (1970.245.1) 37

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37. Bottles with portrait heads. Moche; North Coast, Peru, 500–800 ce. Ceramic and slip. Left: H. 11 in. (27.9 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Nathan Cummings, 1964 (64.228.22). Right: H. 10 ⼀欀 in. (26.4 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Henry G. Marquand, 1882 (82.1.28) person represented across multiple vessels, tracing their vessels may, however, have had extended lives before 31 growth from youth to middle age. All portrait vessels their respective burials. Evidence of wear on the portrait that have been found through scientific excavation have vessels, for example, as well as sherds of them in trash been recovered from high-status burials, where they heaps, suggest that they were used in life before being were part of larger assemblages with other vessels. deposited in tombs. Scenes on two fineline works depict There is no evidence to suggest that the portraits rep- them in ceremonial settings, including one where we resent the entombed individuals, as portraits of men see a dignitary, shown seated atop a platform beneath a have been found with women, and portraits of the same roof ornamented with war clubs, facing a portrait head 38 individual have been found in multiple tombs. These vessel (fig. 38).

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38. Vessel with ritual scene. Moche; North Coast, Peru, 500–800 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 11 ⼀欀 in. (29 cm). Museo Larco, Lima, Peru (ML013653) 39

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39. Bottle with fox head. Moche; North Coast, Peru, 500–800 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 12 ⼀挀 in. (31.8 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Nathan Cummings, 1963 (63.226.6) Whom do the portrait vessels represent? It is tempt- as disembodied heads are often depicted in the hands of 33 ing to see them as depictions of heroic leaders or victori- triumphant warriors and fearsome supernatural figures. 32 ous warriors, possibly communal ancestors. The idea of Yet a bottle in the shape of a fox head with a warrior’s a head as a vessel may be less celebratory than punitive, headdress complicates this reading, reminding us that however, as colonial accounts of Inca warfare describe the these vessels often defy precise interpretation (fig. 39). tradition of converting the skulls of enemies into drinking Moche potters were keen observers of the natural vessels. Furthermore, the similarity of the stirrup-spout world, and many of their vessels, particularly those from form to a rope through a skull—the traditional method earlier periods, reveal careful attention to the details of by which heads taken in battle were transported—casts human and animal physiognomy. But it would be a mis- 40 a shadow over any explanation of the imagery as heroic, take to see these as straightforward genre depictions. As

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40. Stirrup-spout bottle with manioc form. Moche; North Coast, Peru, 600–800 ce. Ceramic and slip, H. 12 ⼀挀 in. (31.8 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Nathan Cummings, 1964 (64.228.57) art historian Lisa Trever has noted, Moche subjects often neously potato, manioc, and human—a restless, dangerous resist Linnaean classification because the depicted object root vegetable. 34 could be at once animal, vegetable, and mineral. One Other vessels, perhaps likewise inspired by the unusual example presents an unexpected combination of a capricious shapes of tubers, are amorphous, provoking fanged human head emerging from a potato body (fig. 40). perceptual uncertainty. One such example—a swirling The tail and limbs are shaped like the roots of manioc, mash-up of recognizable features, including a grimacing another important vegetable in the ancient Andes, while mouth with fangs, nostrils, eyes, and legs, but also fins the limbs are positioned to evoke the movement of an and a beak—is at once a complex composite of a wrinkled insect or a crustacean. By manipulating clay and pigments, human face, an owl, seals or fish, and a crustacean water and fire, this artist created a being that is simulta- (fig. 41). The composition blurs the boundaries between 41

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41. Tuber-inspired stirrup-spout bottle. Moche; North Coast, Peru, 500–800 ce. Ceramic, H. 9 ⼀攀 in. (23.5 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Nathan Cummings, 1964 (64.228.26) 42

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shape, but its glossy surface was achieved with a glaze, a mixture containing silica and metal oxides and other materials that creates a hard, glassy surface after being fired at very high temperatures (fig. 42). The double body may represent two lucumas (Pouteria lucuma), a fruit native to Andean valleys. The small bird on one spout contains a whistling mechanism, continuing a tradition established some 2,500 years earlier. By the late eighteenth century, ceramics that once had been tossed aside became part of a new interest in antiquity manifest in both Europe and the Americas. Baltasar Jaime Martínez Compañón, a Basque cleric appointed to a bishopric in Peru by Charles III of Spain, worked with a team of artists to document both the present and the past of the province of Trujillo in the 1780s. Inspired by the king’s sponsorship of excavations at Herculaneum and Pompeii, the bishop set out to discover his own American antiquity, documenting the finds in a volume of watercolors, one of nine devoted to life in the 35 province. Some of the antiquities illustrated in those 42. Double-chambered bottle. Colonial; Peru, early 17th century. works survive to the present day in the collections of the Ceramic and glaze, H. 5 ⼀挀 in. (14 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museo de América, Madrid. New York; Museum Accession (X.2.292) Antiquities continued to be unearthed in the nine- teenth century both intentionally, for the creation of local species—it is not clear where one figure ends and the collections as well as for the expanding market for antiq- other begins—and ultimately confounds easy analysis. uities abroad, and unintentionally, as sites were uncovered through the expansion of agricultural fields or as a result Afterlives of Antiquities of modernizing interventions, such as the construction 36 The Spanish capture of the Inca emperor Atahualpa in of railroads. The collections assembled in the second Cajamarca in 1532 was the decisive moment in what half of the nineteenth century and at the beginning of became a decade-long campaign to establish the new the twentieth were truly staggering in size: José Mariano Viceroyalty of Peru, one that saw a devastating loss of Macedo (1823–1894), a Peruvian doctor, amassed a col- Native American life through newly introduced diseases lection of some 2,000 works, which he eventually sold against which the Indigenous population had no resis- to Berlin’s Königliches Museum für Völkerkunde (Royal tance. Parallel to the military invasion, a spiritual con- Museum of Ethnology, today’s Ethnologisches Museum 37 quest was mounted to destroy any vestiges of Indigenous of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin). The same museum religious practices, resulting in incalculable numbers acquired the Wilhelm Gretzer collection, totaling some 38 of objects being rooted out and destroyed in the six- 44,000 works, in 1907. Peru’s own national museum was teenth and seventeenth centuries. As ancient sites were established in Lima in 1822, and a later, private museum, plundered in the search for gold and silver, the ceramic the Museo Larco, assembled some 45,000 works by the vessels found in the course of ransacking them were middle of the twentieth century. tossed aside by the Spanish, who considered the material The Met began acquiring ancient Peruvian ceramics of no value and the forms of little interest. in the late nineteenth century, but on a much smaller scale. Despite these prevailing forces, in many communities One of the earliest acquisitions still in the Museum was aspects of traditional life continued, albeit in new ways. purchased from the Honorable Richard Gibbs, U.S. envoy In the first century or so following the Conquest, Peruvian to Peru, with funds provided by Henry Gurdon Marquand potters began to incorporate European technologies and (1819–1902), a financier, collector, Trustee of The Met, and, motifs in their ceramics. An early colonial double-spout- eventually, the institution’s second president (see fig. 23). and-bridge vessel, for example, retains an ancient bottle The Museum’s interest in ancient American art waxed 43

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43. Pitcher. British, ca. 1880. Designed by Christopher Dresser (British, 1834–1904). Linthorpe Pottery Works (1879–89). Glazed earthenware, H. 4 15/16 in. (12.5 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Gift of Florence and Herbert Irving, 2016 (2016.178.7) and waned over the course of its history, and by 1914, as scholars and amateurs alike sought to understand the having decided that such objects were not appropriate for history of the Americas before the arrival of Europeans. an art museum, The Met had largely stopped collecting Lavish folios and more accessibly scaled volumes ded- 39 American antiquities. In time the Museum came to regret icated to Peruvian antiquities were published in the this decision, and by the 1960s it had resumed collection second half of the nineteenth century, among them activities in this area. One of the first exhibitions of ancient Ephraim George Squier’s (1821–1888) influential Peru: American art after this resumption of interest at The Met Incidents of Travel and Exploration in the Land of the Incas 41 was devoted to Peruvian ceramics from the collection of (1877). Such publications, in tandem with the increased Nathan Cummings (1896–1985). A collector of nineteenth- prominence of collections on public display in museums, and twentieth-century European painting and sculp- inspired a number of artists, including the prominent ture as well as Peruvian pots, Cummings purchased two British industrial designer Christopher Dresser, who South American collections formed in the early twentieth counted Peruvian ceramics among his many wide-ranging century: one from the Wasserman family of Buenos Aires, interests. Dresser’s small pitcher with a strap handle and and the other from the Gaffron family, whose patriarch spout recalls both the shapes of ancient, South Coast practiced medicine in Lima and received pots as payments ceramics and the geometric patterning of Inca slip paint- for medical services. Cummings eventually gave half his ing (fig. 43). collection to the Art Institute of Chicago and the other Expanding museum collections in Europe and Peru, half to The Met, where it was featured in an exhibition in along with the increased circulation of archaeological 1964. The Met’s collection has continued to grow since publications, provided a rich trove of imagery for art- that time, primarily with the watershed gifts of Nelson A. ists, who could employ the subject matter as a powerful Rockefeller (1908–1979), which established a new home allegory of strength and independence from Europe and for the display of ancient Peruvian ceramics (and other the colonial legacy. Paintings such as Francisco Laso’s traditions) in 1982.40 Inhabitant of the Peruvian Cordilleras (1855) incorporated Scientific archaeology developed alongside the for- a representation of a Moche ceramic vessel—a prisoner 44 mation of museum collections in the nineteenth century, vessel—as a pivot around which the artist explored com-

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44. Paul Gauguin (French, 1848–1903). Still Life with Apples, a Pear, and a Ceramic Portrait Jug, 1889. Oil on paper mounted on panel, 11 ⼀攀 × 14 ⼀攀 in. (28.6 × 36.2 cm). Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Cambridge; Gift of Walter E. Sachs, 1958 (1958.292) plex ideas about ancient history, the subjugation of Indian populations, and Peruvian national identity (see inside 42 front cover). Within what we think of as the European avant- garde, the French artist Paul Gauguin explored issues of personal identity in a number of ceramic works and paintings. Born in Paris, Gauguin spent part of his child- hood in Peru, where his mother, Alina María Chazal, had 43 family. Chazal was an admirer and collector of ancient Peruvian ceramics, which were considered “barbaric” by other French colonists. Gauguin, like his mother, prized the power of these works, seeing in them great strength and freedom, and on occasion referred to himself as an “Inca,” establishing a dialectic between his constructed identity as a non-European “other”—in this case, meaning a well spring of primal power and creativity rooted in his 44 Peruvian ancestry—and as a Parisian art-world insider. His Still Life with Apples, a Pear, and a Ceramic Portrait Jug features what is unmistakably a seated Moche-style vessel, a sentinel, perhaps as a stand-in for Gauguin himself, in homage to the painter Paul Cézanne (fig. 44).45 Gauguin’s assertion of his Inca heritage was further underscored by a ceramic self-portrait of the same year (fig. 45). There is no question but that these references 45. Gauguin, Pot in the Shape of a Head (Self-Portrait), 1889. Stoneware, H. 7 11/16 in. (19.5 cm). Designmuseum Danmark, Copenhagen were conscious and intentional. 45

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46. Juan Javier Salazar (Peruvian, 1955–2016). Lembrança dos bandeirantes peruanos, 2011. Ceramic and glaze, H. 5 ⼀椀 in. (13 cm). Museo de Arte de Lima, Peru; Gift of the artist (2011.13.1) Such assertions of outsider status, whether real or raiding party; in contemporary parlance, it can also mean imagined, create space for exploration and for a critique fortune hunters. Salazar likened artists to curanderos—the of dominant power structures. Peruvian artist Juan Javier traditional healers—in the belief that the objects they cre- 46 Salazar, after studying in Portugal and Lima, positioned ate can transfer energy and meaning. In a performance himself as apart from the established institutions of the work in Lima in 2002, the artist distributed plush toys modern nation-state to launch visual commentaries on in the shape of Peru to riders of the city’s buses, with the global economies, climate change, and national identities. idea of giving people the chance to metaphorically claim Salazar’s artistic practice drew on elements of Peruvian ownership of their country. Both historical and geograph- history to address contemporary themes and issues such ical in context, Lembrança dos bandeirantes peruanos and as economic inequality and resource overexploitation. His the plush toys subtly critique the history of exploitation of small, feline-shaped double-spout-and-bridge “bottle,” Peru’s natural resources but also the art market, contrib- Lembrança dos bandeirantes peruanos (2011), complete uting to a broader strand of the artist’s oeuvre in which with tiny paws sketched on the underside, can be seen he seeks a formal means of giving back to Peruvians the 47 from above mimicking the shape of the modern coun- possibility of holding their country in their own hands. try of Peru (fig. 46). The title, translated as “Souvenir of Peruvian Bandeirantes,” references the Portuguese word for flag and, by extension, a detached military unit or 46

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Notes 1. This healing mesa was described in Donald Joralemon and Douglas Patronage at Cerro Mayal, Peru,” in Moche Art and Archaeology in Sharon, Sorcery and Shamanism: Curanderos and Clients in Northern Ancient Peru, edited by Joanne Pillsbury, Studies in the History of Peru (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1993), pp. 111–22. Art 63, Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, Symposium On mesas, see Douglas Sharon, “Andean Mesas and Cosmologies,” Papers 40 (Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 2001), pp. Ethnobotany Research and Applications 21 (2021), pp. 1–41, https:// 158–75. ethnobotanyjournal.org/index.php/era/article/view/2623. On 13. A detailed explanation of the construction technique can be found huacas, see Tamara L. Bray, “An Archaeological Perspective on in Christopher B. Donnan and Donna McClelland, Moche Fineline the Andean Concept of Camaquen: Thinking through Late Pre- Painting: Its Evolution and Its Artists (Los Angeles: UCLA Fowler Columbian Ofrendas and Huacas,” Cambridge Archaeological Journal Museum of Cultural History, 1999), pp. 28–31, 44–45. 19, no. 3 (October 2009), pp. 357–66. 14. Ibid., pp. 13–23. 2. Débora L. Soares, “Working with Huacos: Archaeological Ceramics 15. Michele L. Koons, “External versus Internal: An Examination of and Relationships among Worlds in the Peruvian North Coast,” Moche Politics through Similarities and Differences in Ceramic Journal of Social Archaeology 21, no. 3 (2021), pp. 364–65. Style,” in Ceramic Analysis in the Andes, edited by I[sabelle C.] Druc 3. Jean-François Millaire, “The Manipulation of Human Remains in (Blue Mounds, Wis.: Deep University Press, 2015), pp. 57–82. Moche Society: Delayed Burials, Grave Reopening, and Secondary 16. Donnan and McClelland, Moche Fineline Painting, pp. 186–89. Offerings of Human Bones on the Peruvian North Coast,” Latin 17. On Wrinkle Face, see ibid., pp. 64–66. On Moche art and mythol- American Antiquity 15, no. 4 (December 2004), pp. 371–88. ogy, see Krzysztof Makowski, “Las divinidades en la iconografía 4. On the relationship between curanderos and looters, see Soares, mochica,” in Los dioses del antiguo Perú, edited by Krzysztof “Working with Huacos,” pp. 365–68. Makowski, 2 vols. (Lima: Banco de Crédito del Perú, 2000), vol. 1, 5. Prudence M. Rice describes clays as “a fine-grained earthy material pp. 137–75; Jürgen Golte, Moche, cosmología y sociedad: Una inter- that becomes plastic or malleable when moistened” and as a result pretación iconogr愃Āfica (Lima: Instituto de Estudios Peruanos; Cuzco: of the natural degradation of rock-forming minerals in the environ- Centro Bartolomé de Las Casas, 2009). ment; Prudence M. Rice, Pottery Analysis: A Sourcebook (Chicago: 18. Douglas Sharon and Christopher B. Donnan, “Shamanism in Moche University of Chicago Press, 1987), p. 36. The exact composition of a Iconography,” in Ethnoarchaeology: Monograph IV—Archaeological particular clay varies according to regional geology, with traditional Survey, edited by Christopher B. Donnan and C. William Clewlow potters mostly recognizing them in the landscape owing to their Jr. (Los Angeles: Institute of Archaeology, University of California, varying plasticity. 1974), pp. 50–79. 6. Kevin J. Vaughn, “Craft and the Materialization of Chiefly Power 19. Cathy Lynne Costin, “Techno-aesthetic Ceramic Traditions and the in Nasca,” in Foundations of Power in the Prehispanic Andes, edited Effective Communication of Power on the North Coast of Peru,” by Kevin J. Vaughn, Dennis Ogburn, and Christina A. Conlee, World Archaeology 53, no. 5 (December 2021), pp. 881–902; Izumi Archeological Papers of the American Anthropological Association Shimada, “Sicán Metallurgy and Its Cross-craft Relationships,” 14 (Arlington, Va.: American Anthropological Association, 2005), Boletín Museo del Oro, no. 41 (1996), pp. 27–61. pp. 113–30. 20. On Inca pottery and rank, see Craig Morris, “Enclosures of Power: 7. Christina A. Conlee, “Decapitation and Rebirth: A Headless Burial The Multiple Spaces of Inca Administrative Palaces,” in Palaces from Nasca, Peru,” Current Anthropology 48, no. 3 (June 2007), of the Ancient New World: A Symposium at Dumbarton Oaks, 10th pp. 441–42. and 11th October 1998, edited by Susan Toby Evans and Joanne 8. Moisés Tufinio et al., “Excavaciones en la Sección 4 de Huaca del Pillsbury (Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Sol,” in Proyecto Arqueológico Huaca de la Luna: Informe técnico Collection, 2004), pp. 308–10. 2013, edited by S[antiago] Uceda and R[icardo] Morales (Trujillo: 21. Chemical analysis of Wari beakers from Cerro Baúl (600–1000 ce) Universidad Nacional de Trujillo, 2014), p. 116. See also Carlos indicates that settlers were consuming beer made from molle ber- Wester La Torre, Chornancap: Palacio de una gobernante y sacer- ries. See Patrick Ryan Williams et al., “Archaeometric Approaches to dotisa de la cultura Lambayeque (Chiclayo: Ministerio de Cultura Defining Sustainable Governance: Wari Brewing Traditions and the del Perú, 2016), p. 282, for a repaired Moche vessel, created around Building of Political Relationships in Ancient Peru,” Sustainability 11, the seventh century ce, found in a Lambayeque burial from several no. 8 (2019), p. 2333. centuries later (1100–1350). 22. Hugo C. Ikehara, J. Fiorella Paipay, and Koichiro Shibata, “Feasting 9. The Cupisnique and Chavín styles are related to Chavín de Huántar, with Zea Mays in the Middle and Late Formative North Coast of a religious complex in the highlands. Excavations there have Peru,” Latin American Antiquity 24, no. 2 (June 2013), pp. 217–31. revealed extensive remains from feasts dating to the first millennium 23. Rebecca Stone-Miller, “Mimesis as Participation: Imagery, Style, and bce, including in the Galería de las Ofrendas at Chavín de Huántar, Function of the Michael C. Carlos Museum Paccha, an Inka Ritual where hundreds of finely made bottles and bowls of different styles Watering Device,” in Kay Pacha: Cultivating Earth and Water in the were found together with food remains. Similar finds have been Andes, edited by Penelope Dransart, BAR International Series 1478 reported from coastal sites, including Cerro Blanco in the Nepeña (Oxford: Archaeopress, 2006), pp. 215–24. Valley. 24. The jar known as Coca Mama was venerated in the town of San 10. Hugo Ikehara and Koichiro Shibata, “Festines e integración social en Gerónimo de Copa, Cajatambo. See Mario Polia Meconi, La cosmo- el Periodo Formativo: Nuevas evidencias de Cerro Blanco, valle bajo visión religiosa andina en los documentos inéditos del Archivo Romano de Nepeña,” Boletín de Arqueología PUCP, no. 9 (2005), pp. 123–59. de la Compañía de Jesús, 1581–1752 (Lima: Pontificia Universidad 11. It is worth noting that the blue colorants on some Paracas vessels Católica del Perú, Fondo Editorial, 1999), p. 174. contain indigo, a plant-based pigment, known also to have been used 25. Ibid., p. 179. It was not uncommon that Andean deities, at as a dye in Paracas textiles. See Dawn Kriss et al., “A Material and least during the sixteenth century, were related using kinship Technical Study of Paracas Painted Ceramics,” Antiquity 92, no. 366 terminology. (December 2018), pp. 1492–510, and esp. pp. 1505–7 on indigo. 26. Ibid., p. 537: “en cuya prinçipal fuente tenia de varro antiguo forma 12. Santiago Uceda and José Armas, “Los talleres alfareros en el centro de un rostro de Demonio.” urbano moche,” in Investigaciones en la Huaca de la Luna, 1995, 27. Vaughn, “Craft and the Materialization of Chiefly Power,” pp. 119–20. edited by S[antiago] Uceda, E[lías] Mujica, and R[icardo] Morales 28. Kevin J. Vaughn, “Households, Crafts, and Feasting in the Ancient (Trujillo: Universidad Nacional de La Libertad, 1995), pp. 93–104; Andes: The Village Context of Early Nasca Craft Consumption,” Glenn S. Russell and Margaret A. Jackson, “Political Economy and Latin American Antiquity 15, no. 1 (March 2004), pp. 61–88. 47

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29. Lisa DeLeonardis, “The Body Context: Interpreting Early Nasca 40. The Museum generally does not acquire an antiquity unless Decapitated Burials,” Latin American Antiquity 11, no. 4 (December provenance research substantiates that the work was outside its 2000), pp. 363–86; Conlee, “Decapitation and Rebirth,” pp. 438–45. country of probable modern discovery before 1970 or was legally 30. For instance, the portrait head in The Met collection (82.1.28) can exported from its probable country of modern discovery after 1970. be compared with a similar one in the Museo Central-BCRP, Lima For more on The Met’s policies, see The Metropolitan Museum of (ACE-0906), or another in the Museo Larco, Lima (ML013550). Art, Collections Management Policy, September 13, 2022, https:// 31. Christopher B. Donnan, Moche Portraits from Ancient Peru (Austin: www.metmuseum.org/-/media/files/about-the-met/policies- University of Texas Press, 2004), pp. 141–59. and-documents/collections-management-policy/Collections- 32. Mary Weismantel, “Many Heads Are Better than One: Mortuary Management-Policy.pdf. Practice and Ceramic Art in Moche Society,” in Living with the Dead 41. Joanne Pillsbury, ed., Past Presented: Archaeological Illustration and in the Andes, edited by Izumi Shimada and James L. Fitzsimmons the Ancient Americas, Dumbarton Oaks Pre-Columbian Symposia & (Tucson: The University of Arizona Press, 2015), pp. 76–100. Colloquia (Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and 33. Joanne Pillsbury, “Moche Portrait Vessels,” in Heilbrunn Timeline Collection, 2012). of Art History (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 42. Natalia Majluf, “‘Ce n’est pas le Pérou,’ or, the Failure of 2000– ), http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/mphv/hd_mphv.htm Authenticity: Marginal Cosmopolitans at the Paris Universal (accessed September 2021). Severed heads with ropes through the Exhibition of 1855,” Critical Inquiry 23, no. 4 (Summer 1997), pp. crania are sometimes referred to as “trophy heads.” 875–89; Natalia Majluf, Inventing Indigenism: Francisco Laso’s Image 34. Lisa Trever, “A Moche Riddle in Clay: Object Knowledge and Art of Modern Peru (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2021). Work in Ancient Peru,” The Art Bulletin 101, no. 4 (December 2019), 43. Gauguin’s maternal grandmother was the French-Peruvian socialist pp. 18–38. writer Flora Tristan. 35. Joanne Pillsbury and Lisa Trever, “The King, the Bishop, and the 44. Paul Gauguin, Le Pouldu, to Theo van Gogh, November 20 or 21, Creation of an American Antiquity,” Ñawpa Pacha 29 (2008), pp. 1889, in Gauguin by Himself, edited by Belinda Thomson (Boston: 191–219; Lisa Trever and Joanne Pillsbury, “Martínez Compañón and Little, Brown and Company, 1993), p. 111. See also Theo van Gogh to His Illustrated ‘Museum,’” in Collecting across Cultures: Material Vincent van Gogh, December 22, 1889, in Belinda Thomson, “Paul Exchanges in the Early Modern Atlantic World, edited by Daniela Gauguin: Navigating the Myth,” in Gauguin: Maker of Myth, by Bleichmar and Peter C. Mancall (Philadelphia: University of Belinda Thomson et al., exh. cat. (London: Tate Publishing, 2010), Pennsylvania Press, 2011), pp. 236–53, 325–32, pls. 9–10. pp. 12, 229n8. 36. The earliest works of Peruvian ceramics to enter The Met (but later 45. Dario Gamboni, “Animation and Personhood: Gauguin’s Still Lifes deaccessioned) were acquired by Walton W. Evans, who worked on as Portraits,” in Gauguin: Portraits, by Cornelia Homburg et al., exh. the Arica-to-Tacna railroad in southern Peru. cat. (Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada; London: National Gallery, 37. Stefanie G愃ࠀnger, Relics of the Past: The Collecting and Study of 2019), pp. 197–225, esp. p. 202. Pre-Columbian Antiquities in Peru and Chile, 1837–1911 (Oxford 46. For an interview with the artist discussing these themes, see Rodrigo and New York: Oxford University Press, 2014), pp. 101–59. See also Quijano, “Juan Javier Salazar: La realidad entera está en llamas,” Joanne Pillsbury, “Finding the Ancient in the Andes: Archaeology Artishock: Revista de arte contempor愃Āneo (January 20, 2018), https:// and Geology, 1850–1890,” in Nature and Antiquities: The Making artishockrevista.com/2018/01/20/juan-javier-salazar/. of Archaeology in the Americas, edited by Philip L. Kohl, Irina 47. Emilio Tarazona, “Droughts, Precipitation, Overflows . . . : Aspects of Podgorny, and Stefanie G愃ࠀnger (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, the Work of Juan Javier Salazar Seen Vis-à-Vis Climate Change and 2014), pp. 47–68. Socioeconomic Change in Contemporary Peru,” in Sur, sur, sur, sur/ 38. Beatrix Hoffmann, “Wilhelm Gretzer and His Collection of Peruvian South, South, South, South: Séptimo Simposio Internacional de Teoría Antiquities at the Ethnological Museum in Berlin,” in PreColumbian y Arte Contempor愃Āneo, edited by Cuauhtémoc Medina, SITAC 7 Textiles in the Ethnological Museum in Berlin, edited by Lena (Mexico City: Patronato de Arte Contemporáneo, 2010), pp. 128–47. Bjerregaard and Torben Huss (Lincoln, Neb.: Zea Books, 2017), See also Salazar’s action Perú Express (2002), for which he distrib- pp. 8–14. uted stuffed toys in the shape of the country to riders on city buses 39. Joanne Pillsbury, “Aztecs in the Empire City: ‘The People without on July 28, Peru’s annual independence day; “Juan Javier Salazar History’ in The Met,” Metropolitan Museum Journal 56 (2021), (1955–2016) Perú Express: El intento final de un artista por entender pp. 12–31. al Perú,” La Mula TV (November 1, 2016), https://www.youtube .com/watch?v=FtBPoGuHxIg.