Mummy Mask

Discussion

FROM THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO’S CATALOG

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.

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