For PAN Amsterdam 2026, Jonathan F. Kugel – Cabinet de Curiosités Contemporain presents a selection of works from Ayala's ongoing series Huacos.

The series takes its name from huacos, ceramic vessels produced by pre-Columbian Andean cultures including the Moche, Nazca, Chimú and Inca. These objects embody sophisticated relationships between human beings, their territories, the natural world and the sacred.
Following a research residency at the Museo Larco in Lima in 2023, where Ayala studied one of the world's most significant collections of pre-Columbian Andean ceramics, these historical forms became the starting point for a series of speculative archaeological vessels.
Rather than reconstructing an idealised pre-Columbian past, Huacos brings ancestral forms and symbolism into dialogue with contemporary popular culture. Familiar global imagery is absorbed, transformed and reinterpreted through the language of Andean ceramics, creating objects that appear simultaneously ancient and contemporary.
Through these unexpected hybridisations, Ayala challenges conventional distinctions between ancestral and contemporary, local and global, nature and culture. Each Huaco becomes an object of cultural encounter: playful and unsettling, yet grounded in rigorous research and exceptional craftsmanship.
The series was further developed during Ayala's residency at the Fondation d'entreprise Martell in Cognac, from November 2025 to January 2026.