The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 14, 2025

Painted Drum

500–1000

Central Andes, Middle Horizon, North Coast?

Animal hide, gesso, wooden slats, pigment
Overall: 27 x 28 x 12 cm (10 5/8 x 11 x 4 3/4 in.)
Severance and Greta Millikin Purchase Fund 2022.37
Location: Not on view

Did You Know?

This painted drum may have been played by a woman in antiquity.

Description

In the 1600s, music was so important to Indigenous Andean ceremonial life that Spaniards destroyed thousands of musical instruments to hasten Natives’ conversion to Christianity. The number of surviving, older instruments suggests that music had similar import in earlier periods. This rare example is painted with a figure wearing a crescent headdress, an emblem of status; it may have been played by a woman.
  • Before 1969-2005
    Adolph Brenner, Zurich, Switzerland, sold to Daniel Rifkin
    2005-2022
    Private Collector, New York, NY, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art
    2022-
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • Ancient Andean Textiles. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (December 9, 2022-December 3, 2023).
  • {{cite web|title=Painted Drum|url=false|author=|year=500–1000|access-date=14 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2022.37