Cleveland Museum of Art

Female Figurine

Date

300–600 CE

Medium

ceramic, pigment

Culture

Mesoamerica, Veracruz, Huastec, Panuco Style

Department

Art of the Americas

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

Clay was a major medium in ancient Veracruz, located on Mexico’s Gulf Coast, and artists used it to create huge quantities of sculpture ranging from small whistles and figurines like this one to impressive, life-size figural effigies. Meanings are often obscure, but small objects were important enough to have been deposited in tombs and buried offerings. Clay figurines were the earliest and most common art form in the ancient Mesoamerican culture region.

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