Painting as aesthetic expression was shown on murals and mantles. Bonavía indicates the difference between walls painted one or several colors and the murals with designs or motifs representing different scenes.

The painted murals are applied on walls plastered with mud using tempera paint, a technique different from that utilized for rupestrian paintings. Around the Early Horizon paint was applied directly on the plastered wall, while during the Early Intermediate Period the plastered wall was covered with white paint in order to later apply the desired drawing. Another medium used in the same epoch consisted of drawing motifs incised on damp mud in order to later fill the incisions with paint.

In the Moche epoch mural paintings and high relief paintings of mud such as those discovered in the Huaca de la Luna and the Huaca del Brujo in Chicama.

The technique and use of mantles painted on plain cotton cloth was the custom along the entire coast, with greater emphasis in the north. Around the years 1570 to 1577, there were still artists who specialized in the art of painting mantles and practiced their craft, traveling from one place to another. At that time these artists asked for license before the judge to use their art and go freely through the valleys without being hindered.

These mantles can be appreciated in museums and private collections. Perhaps they were used to cover naked walls or served as garments for important lords.

Another line within pictorial art was the execution of a sort of painted map which represented a place or a region. The chronicler Betanzos recounts that after the defeat of the Chancas inflicted by Prince Cusi Yupanqui, the Cuzco dignitaries presented themselves before him to offer him the tassel and they found him painting the changes he was thinking of introducing in Cuzco.

This notice would not be sufficient for confirming such a practice if it were not supported by another reference, the affirmation in the trial sustained by the ethnicities of Canta and of Chaclla in 1558-1570. One of the litigants presented there before the Royal Tribunal of Lima drawings of his valley indicating his territorial claims, while the second litigants exhibited a maquette of clay of the entire valley. Sarmiento de Gamboa said that on conquering a valley, they made a maquette and presented it to the Inca, who in front of those entrusted with executing the changes were informed of his desires.