189 – Painting Peru

Christa Dichgans (°1940 in Berlin) is a German painter who has shown a proclivity towards cartography in her work. Generally, her map paintings consist of a monochrome background surmounted with the contours of a country or continent, filled up with stuff of all sorts.

‘Amerika’ represents a gazillion dollar bills forming the Lower 48 States, contrasting with a yellow background. ‘Europa’ shows a continent consisting of an uncountable number of human faces against a blue background. Other examples of this technique are ‘Deutschland’, ‘Indien’, ‘Der schwarze Kontinent’ and this painting, ‘Peru’.

The 2004 oil painting shows the contours of this South American country. Inside its borders, small religious and folkloric figurines are pasted over the black background, creating the impression of something like a cigar label collection. Outside Peru’s borders, the yellow background is embroidered with button-like embellishments.

This map, and other examples of Dichgans’ work, can be found here.