The art of being Diaguita

A little history

The Chilean Diaguita culture emerged in the late pre-Hispanic era in the fertile Huasco, Elqui, Limarí and Choapa valleys of the Norte Chico as a diverse group of communities subsisting on agriculture, animal husbandry and the extraction of marine resources. Groups seem to have been organized into “halves” in each valley, with one cacique as leader of the upper sector and another governing the lower. The archaeological Diaguita are best known today for their finely-crafted ceramics, which include an extensive repertoire of forms, including the emblematic “duck-shaped pitcher”, with its globular body and modeled head joined to the spout by a handle. In the pre-Columbian world, Diaguita ceramics are striking for their singular combination of white, black and red geometric and figurative designs.
Their origins can be traced back to around AD 700, in the Las Ánimas cultural complex, whose final phase is contemporary with the initial Diaguita phase. The Diaguita culture emerged clearly around AD 1000, and reached its peak in 1300. Around AD 1400, the Diaguita were incorporated into the Inka Empire, a process expressed in the Diaguita-Inka ceramic style. As allies of the Inkas, the Diaguita moved north to the Copiapó Valley and south to the Santiago basin, also crossing to the eastern side of the Andes. In 1535, Diego de Almagro and his army rode through the Norte Chico on their way to Central Chile, an episode that marked the end of the pre-Hispanic era and the beginning of Spanish conquest and domination—a time known as the Colonial Period.
In 1548, the Diaguita rebelled against the Spaniards and destroyed the city of La Serena; the Spaniards refounded it a year later in its present location. After 1570, the Diaguita virtually disappear from the historic record. It is not known for certain whether they were decimated by illness, or disappeared gradually by mixing with other ethnic groups or survived in certain places into the Republican era. The fact is that in 2006 the Government of Chile officially recognized the Diaguita as the country’s ninth indigenous people. Today, they are represented in the Huasco Valley by the “Comunidad Diaguita Huascoaltina” and in the Choapa Valley by the “Comunidad Diaguita Taucán”.
Scripts of this exhibition show that in pre-Inka, Inka, Colonial and Republican times, there have been different ways of “being Diaguita”. As you will see in the videos at the end of the exhibition, present people from the Norte Chico show us their way of feeling Diaguita.