This surrealistically drawn zoomorphic figure of the Ocucaje Oculate Deity is an archaic rendition and seminal symbol of Pre-Columbian art in the southern Ica Valley of Peru from 400 BC, characterised by its highly stylised frontal body and daring expression from seemingly another world. The arts of the Andes are renowned for their surreal and versatile rendering of earthly beings, which is connected to the Andes’ ritual belief. In the Pre-Columbian cosmology, human and other zoomorphic beings are equally transformative and spiritual, who serve as mortal forms of the divine nature.




Most scholars view the kneeling monkey as the prototype for later further stylised developments. The Monkey is a revered icon from the Amazonian tropical lowlands and was later known by dwellers in the coastal area. As James Reid wrote: “these figures possess ‘quasi-human faces,’ as well as antics and social behaviour that ‘foster the projection of human qualities and personae upon them.” With a sense of wonderment and awe, these images foreshadow how surrealists in the later centuries perceive the world as the manifestation of bewilderment, metamorphosis and mystery.




The iconography in this textile directly relates to the later cultures of Paracas-Cavernas, in the area of ​​Ica, was contemporary to the Chavín culture and although it is considered independent from it, shows at first an influence of the Chavín style in the ceramics known as “Ocucaje”.




The Paracas-Cavernas culture was named after its underground funerary caverns, which are reached by a narrow vertical well that ends in a hemispherical chamber of about 4 m in diameter.