Poncho with Musicians (Poncho con músicos)

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Poncho with Musicians (Poncho con músicos)

Peru, southern Andes, late 17th-early 18th century
Costumes; outerwear
Cotton, camelid-fiber, and silk and metallic-thread tapestry weave
69 1/2 × 66 in. (176.5 × 167.6 cm)
Gift of Miss Bella Mabury (M.40.1.76)
Not currently on public view

Provenance

Bella Mabury, Los Angeles, before 1939; Los Angeles Museum of History, Science, and Art (LACMA’s parent institution), 1940.

Label

Public celebrations in Cuzco and Potosí, in present-day Peru and Bolivia, were known for their extravagance.

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Public celebrations in Cuzco and Potosí, in present-day Peru and Bolivia, were known for their extravagance. This fine poncho would have been worn in procession by musicians, its silver threads glimmering in the sunlight. Employing traditional methods of the Inca master weavers (cumbicamayos), the poncho is filled with European-style imagery, such as cherubs, double-headed eagles, scrollwork, vines, and vases. Four musicians with trumpets—two on each side—wear fashionable Spanish dress. Tucked within these designs, birds, lions, monkeys, and other animals, including the Andean mountain viscacha (a rodent in the chinchilla family), provide ample evidence of Andean life.


From exhibition Archive of the World, 2022 (for more information see the catalogue entry by Elena Phipps in the accompanying publication, cat. no. 33, pp. 175–77)
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Bibliography

  • Katzew, Ilona, ed. Archive of the World: Art and Imagination in Spanish America, 1500–1800: Highlights from LACMA’s Collection. Exh. Cat. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art; New York: DelMonico Books/D.A.P., 2022.
  • Katzew, Ilona, ed. Archive of the World: Art and Imagination in Spanish America, 1500–1800: Highlights from LACMA’s Collection. Exh. Cat. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art; New York: DelMonico Books/D.A.P., 2022.
  • Kahlenberg, Mary Hunt. Fabric and Fashion: Twenty Years of Costume Council Gifts. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1974.
  • Phipps, Elena, Johanna Hecht, and Cristina Esteras Martín, eds. The Colonial Andes: Tapestries and Silverwork, 1530–1830. Exh. cat. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art; New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2004.
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Exhibition history

  • Contested Visions in the Spanish Colonial World Los Angeles, CA, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, November 6, 2011 - January 29, 2012
  • Archive of the World: Art and Imagination in Spanish America, 1500–1800 Los Angeles, CA, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, June 12, 2022 - October 30, 2022
  • Contested Visions in the Spanish Colonial World Los Angeles, CA, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, November 6, 2011 - January 29, 2012
  • Archive of the World: Art and Imagination in Spanish America, 1500–1800 Los Angeles, CA, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, June 12, 2022 - October 30, 2022
  • Archive of the World: Art and Imagination in Spanish America, 1500–1800 Nashville, TN, Frist Art Museum, October 20, 2023 - January 28, 2024
  • The Colonial Andes: Tapestries and Silverwork, 1530–1830 New York, NY, Metropolitan Museum of Art, September 29, 2004 - December 12, 2004
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