A few weekends ago, my mom flew in to visit. During her stay, we went to the Carlos Museum, something I had been meaning to do in light of the refresh exhibits. Of the pieces on display, both her and I found the South American works incredibly interesting. The various effigies and sculptures, especially the ceramics of Columbia, had an especially playful quality to them. In their depictions of human figures, they were nearly humorous caricatures, highlighting features in ways the clearly elucidated the focus of the piece.
The really striking thing of all the pieces, spanning across Central and Southern American cultures, was the complex use of raw materials. While this is of course the case in such works of art, it never fails to amaze me how versatile the cultivation and processing of plants and minerals can be. Modern art and technology is an inherent product of the eventual efficiency of this processing and cultivation, but not in the same way as the earlier cultures. In the artifacts of the Inka, the Chancay, and the many others, the plants and minerals retain identifying and clear characteristics. The origin of their composition is evident in the final pieces, a stark contrast to most modern artifacts, which keep their constituents thoroughly hidden. The woven Chimu tapestry is clearly of natural fibers, and it takes extraordinarily little investigation to mentally retrieve its original form as a cotton bush. The polyester comforter at home is a total mystery without some invested research. This reflects for me a broader implication of the differences in cultural relations to a place. To create such a woven tapestry requires a specific and constant land, likely fostering a sort of respect and relationship with the area very different to those of modern life. Not to say that it’s impossible to form such a connection to an area of land now, but that the extreme differences in the nature of such connections is evident in the cultural products.
