Pre-Columbian, West Mexico, Nayarit, ca. 300 BCE to 300 CE. It is very rare to find matched pairs of these figures, and this set contains wonderful details! The male stands, holding a round object - a ball? - on one shoulder, with his other hand on his stomach. He wears a large headdress with four crest-like projections and a strap around the chin, as well as a nose ring and earrings. His body is painted with cream designs which are still very visible and may represent clothing or possibly tattooing or scarification. He has either a naked, dangling phallus or a thin loincloth. The woman wears a skirt with similar cream line designs to the man's body; she olds a cup in one hand and a small dog in the other. She has a simple headdress with a similar painted design to the one the man wears, and also wears matching nose ring and earrings. Both have their faces painted with a series of black lines, also possibly signs of tattooing, that appear to match. Their eyes are wide and staring, their mouths slightly open, and their noses remarkably similar in shape. Pairs like these may represent married couples or possibly siblings or other members of the same family. Size: 7.5" W x 11" H (19 cm x 27.9 cm)

Clay figures like this one are the only remains that we have today of a sophisticated and unique culture in West Mexico -- they made no above-ground monuments or sculptures, at least that we know of, which is in strong contrast to developments elsewhere in ancient Mesoamerica. Instead, their tombs were their lasting works of art: skeletons arrayed radially with their feet positioned inward, and clay offerings, like this one, placed alongside the walls facing inward, near the skulls. Some scholars have connected these dynamic sculptures of the living as a strong contrast to the skeletal remains whose space they shared, as if they mediated between the living and the dead.

Provenance: Ex-Berman collection acquired before 1975

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#118785

Liberal manganese deposits and nice remaining pigment. Small, unrepaired crack to male's headdress.