eBook - ePub

The Royal Inca Tunic

Name: The Royal Inca Tunic
ISBN: 9780691256962

A Biography of an Andean Masterpiece

Andrew James Hamilton,

344 pages
English
ePUB (mobile friendly)
Available on iOS & Android

eBook - ePub

The Royal Inca Tunic

A Biography of an Andean Masterpiece

Andrew James Hamilton,

About this book

The hidden life of the greatest surviving work of Inca art

The most celebrated Andean artwork in the world is a five-hundred-year-old Inca tunic made famous through theories about the meanings of its intricate designs, including attempts to read them as a long-lost writing system. But very little is really known about it. The Royal Inca Tunic reconstructs the history of this enigmatic object, presenting significant new findings about its manufacture and symbolism in Inca visual culture.

Andrew James Hamilton draws on meticulous physical examinations of the garment conducted over a decade, wide-ranging studies of colonial Peruvian manuscripts, and groundbreaking research into the tunic’s provenance. He methodically builds a case for the textile having been woven by two women who belonged to the very highest echelon of Inca artists for the last emperor of the Inca Empire on the eve of the Spanish invasion in 1532. Hamilton reveals for the first time that this imperial vestment remains unfinished and has suffered massive dye fading that transforms its appearance today, and he proposes a bold new conception of what this radiant masterpiece originally looked like.

Featuring stunning photography of the tunic and Hamilton’s own beautiful illustrations, The Royal Inca Tunic demonstrates why this object holds an important place in the canon of art history as a deft creation by Indigenous women artists, a reminder of the horrors of colonialism, and an emblem of contemporary Andean identity.

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Yes, you can access The Royal Inca Tunic by Andrew James Hamilton in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Art & Fashion Design. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.