Drawing on the Art and Ire of the Colonial Era : Exhibit: Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala’s graphic indictment of Spanish rule in Peru is on display in Fullerton.

In 1585, Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala began writing a letter to the king of Spain.

That in itself was an audacious act for a native Andean under Peru’s repressive colonial regime. But Guaman Poma went far beyond merely audacious: His illustrated “letter” contained 1,188 pages and, among other things, extensively detailed the abuse of Indians and the decimation of Andean culture at the hands of the Spanish colonial administration. He even offered the monarch his advice on a better government.

Guaman Poma finished his mammoth task in 1615, but the next three centuries in the manuscript’s history are a blank. The work was unknown to historians until it turned up in 1908 in, of all places, the Royal Library of Copenhagen.

The discovery set in motion a continuing flow of scholarly interest, but the manuscript and its extraordinary author have remained largely unknown to the public. The New York-based Americas Society is attempting to change that in this quincentennial of Columbus’ arrival with an exhibit that is now on display at the Fullerton Museum Center: “Guaman Poma de Ayala: The Colonial Art of an Andean Author.”

Guaman Poma’s manuscript is no mere work of arcane historical interest; it distills the questions of cultural identity that continue to face Latin America today, questions that have been underscored by the debates generated by the Columbus quincentennial, says exhibit curator Mercedes Lopez-Baralt.

Modern audiences “shouldn’t be looking at it as some archaic or distant subject. It’s very much alive,” said historian Lopez-Baralt in a phone interview from the University of Puerto Rico. “It’s very important, I think, that this text shows the rich complexity of Latin America. We are culturally and linguistically very mixed.”

The manuscript, in some senses, defines “the moment of genesis of Latin American cultural identity,” said John Farmer, a curatorial assistant for the exhibit. “It’s still very relevant to the debate today.”

Guaman Poma was born in Peru, about 1535, to the Yarovilca people. It is not certain how he learned to read and write in Spanish, but in the 1560s he collaborated with the Catholic Church in a campaign to eliminate idolatry in native communities; later he worked as a translator for the church, helping to produce grammars, dictionaries and catechisms in the native language.

According to his own writings and other documentation, Guaman Poma came to regret collaborating with Europeans and became actively dissident. He was exiled twice from his city of Huamanga after being accused of subversive activities--notably teaching fellow natives to read and write so they could file legal claims to recover their land.

The manuscript Guaman Poma began penning to King Philip of Spain leaned heavily on drawings to convey his message--398 line drawings in all, depicting everything from the Spanish conquest of the Incas to the abuse of Indians by colonial administrators. Wall-mounted reproductions of the works, together with artifacts of colonial-era Peru, form the basis of the Fullerton Museum Center exhibit, on view through Nov. 29.

Although the manuscript was written in the form of a letter, Guaman Poma clearly had hopes for a wider audience, and pleaded with the king to publish the text. Although it is believed the manuscript was delivered to the Spanish royal court in Madrid, there is no evidence it was ever presented to the king, and it was never reproduced until a facsimile edition was published in 1936.

Part history, part ethnography, part political treatise, the manuscript (titled “Nueva coronica i buen gobierno,” or “New Chronicle and Good Government”) breaks down into four main sections: a description of native Andean culture, which was fast disappearing; a history of the Spanish conquest, in which Guaman Poma took issue with chronicles written by the Spanish; a depiction of the abuses inflicted by the colonial government, and finally, an outline for the author’s vision of good government.

There are other accounts of Spanish-ruled America from the pen of native authors, but few from Peru. Of the others, particularly those from Mexico, most were sponsored by the church and, as such, were not critical accounts of colonial rule. “Guaman Poma was not sponsored by anyone,” said Lopez-Baralt. “On the contrary, he was twice exiled from his province. He was considered a troublemaker.”

Since the manuscript’s discovery, it has been the subject of much academic interest for, among other reasons, its first-hand native account of life under colonial rule. In recent years, Lopez-Baralt and others have taken an increasing interest in the drawings.

At first viewing, the artworks can seem straightforward, untutored representations of events and places, heavily influenced by European book illustration. But beneath the surface, scholars say, is a hidden language of symbology and spatial relationships that connects the Andean author to his native culture.

The drawings “seem very simple, very naive at first. One of the points of the exhibition is that they are not naive at all,” Lopez-Baralt explained.

The spatial relationship of elements within the drawings has a hidden meaning, Lopez-Baralt said. For example, in one drawing of a conquistador defeating an Inca warrior, the Inca is placed on the right (from the viewpoint of figures within the picture), a position that emphasizes his moral superiority, even in defeat.

“The symbolic position of figures within the visual space are charged with an ethical judgment made by the author,” Lopez-Baralt said. So, a drawing picturing a defeat of the native warrior “could be read also as a message of hope.” Such symbolic positioning is used throughout Guaman Poma’s work, Lopez-Baralt said.

Symbols are used in other ways. In a banquet scene, “you can see on a tray what seems to be a roasted chicken,” Lopez-Baralt said. “If you take a look, it’s actually a female body.” The tray is being presented to a Spaniard by a native server; the symbolic meaning of the drawing relates to the sexual servitude of Andean women to their colonial masters, Lopez-Baralt said.

Lopez-Baralt likens Guaman Poma’s text to contemporary Latin American writing, which infuses a traditional European form--the novel--with oral traditions and symbology rooted in native cultures.

“We are a blend,” she said. “It shows in our literature today.”

“Guaman Poma de Ayala: The Colonial Art of an Andean Author” is open noon to 4 p.m. Tuesday, Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday and noon to 9 p.m. Thursday and Friday at the Fullerton Museum Center, 301 N. Pomona Ave., Fullerton. The exhibit runs through Nov. 29. $2, adults; $1, students and seniors, free to museum members and children under 12 (free to all visitors each Thursday from 6 to 9 p.m.). (714) 738-6545.