Funerary Bundle Mask (2nd century BCE): Artwork and History

Funerary Bundle Mask (2nd century BCE) is in the Art Institute of Chicago collection. The museum lists its creator attribution as Paracas Probably Ocucaje, Ica Valley, south coast, Peru.

The work and its context

The Art Institute of Chicago describes the work:

Ancient South American communities maintained elaborate funerary traditions that included preserving and dressing the dead. Among the Paracas from the south coast of what is now Peru, deceased individuals were placed in a seated position and wrapped in layers of textiles and offerings, forming rounded bundles about three to four feet high. These bundles were often dressed in garments, headdresses, and masks, suggesting that the deceased’s identity continued after death. Masks with lengths of unwoven warp loops—either folded behind the mask or tied into a circular topknot—were padded with unspun cotton and sewn atop a funerary bundles to emulate a human head and hair. They were painted with stylized faces and supernatural beings; this masks displays a standing figure with serpent-like streamers emerging from its body.

Object facts

• Title: Funerary Bundle Mask
• Date: 2nd century BCE
• Artist attribution: Paracas Probably Ocucaje, Ica Valley, south coast, Peru
• Place of origin: Peru
• Medium: Cotton, plain weave with bundles of extended warps; painted
• Dimensions: 75.6 × 23.2 cm (29 3/4 × 9 1/8 in.)
• Type: Textile
• Department: Textiles
• Reference number: 1957.76

Collection credit

Simeon B. Williams Fund

View the original

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The description above is credited to the Art Institute of Chicago and reused under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0; HTML formatting has been converted to plain text. Other catalogue metadata and the public-domain image are provided under CC0 1.0.