travel south america peru lima pueblo libre district museo larco checan erotic gallery
The Checan Erotic Gallery is a second museum in the Museo Larco complex located in the lower courtyard along with gardens and a cafe.
This gallery features archaeological objects found by Rafael Larco Hoyle in the 1960s while researching sexual representations in Peruvian pre-Columbian art.
As explained in the labeling under the second image, "In the Andean worldview, life is made possible throuigh a generative encounter... between opposite complementary forces...
Female and male bodies are an expression of this duality."
Most of the pieces in the collection were labeled in detail in several languages. In most cases, I have tried to summarize the labeling in the image title.
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TRAVEL: March, 2024...
This location has earned an over-all four-and-a-half star (very good+) rating from
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****1/2
unless noted otherwise all images copyright d. holmes chamberlin jr architect llc
Clay figures near the entrance to the gallery, Checan Erotic Gallery, Museo Larco, Lima, Peru, 2024.
A clay pitcher, and two clay bottles, Checan Erotic Gallery, Museo Larco, Lima, Peru, 2024.
Label: "DUALITY In the Andean worldview, life is made possible through a generative encounter... between opposite complementary forces...
Female and male bodies are an expression of this duality."
On the left is a "sculptural clay pitcher depicting a flaccid penis and large testicles."
In the center is a "pottery bottle depicting a vulva and clitoris... The black color of the piece is associated with the symbolic relationship of
the feminine with the nocturnal space, and with the underworld."
On the right is a "clay bottle representing duality through the use of two alternating complementary colors."
Pottery vessel "huacos" featuring a loving couple with a headless man, Checan Erotic Gallery, Museo Larco, Lima, Peru, 2024.
"Huacos," in Peru, is a generic name give to earthen vessels and other finely made pottery artworks by the indigenous peoples of the Americas.
A pair of "articulated wooden dolls represent a man and a woman both wearing face paint... engaged in the act of fellatio",
Chancay culture, Imperial Epoch (1300 AD - 1500 AD), Checan Erotic Gallery, Museo Larco, Lima, Peru, 2024.
"In ancient Peru, scenes depicting fellatio are associated with ritual offerings intended to propitiate the fertility of the earth."
Three more figures representing the act of fellatio, Checan Erotic Gallery, Museo Larco, Lima, Peru, 2024.
Three pottery figures on the subject of pregnancy, Checan Erotic Gallery, Museo Larco, Lima, Peru, 2024.
"Childbirth marks the transition from the dark, watery interior of the mother's uterus deep within the female body, to the exteior world."
These four pots tell of an episode of Moche mythology and their hero Ai Apaec, Checan Erotic Gallery, Museo Larco, Lima, Peru, 2024.
Ai Apaec is said to have travelled to the inner world and had sexual union with a woman thought to be Mother Earth (Moche style 1 AD - 800 AD).
"Moche art presents a comprehensive set of representations of sexual activities, including copulation between humans and deities."
copyright d. holmes chamberlin jr architect llc
page last revised july 2024