The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of August 12, 2022

Urn Figure

c. AD 200-500 (Thermoluminescence date, 60 BC-AD 390)

Mexico, Oaxaca, Zapotec

Earthenware

Overall: 26.1 x 16.3 x 16.3 cm (10 1/4 x 6 7/16 x 6 7/16 in.)

Gift of Mr. and Mrs. James C. Gruener 1990.277

Location

233 Mesoamerican and Intermediate Region

Description

The figure projecting from the front of a cylindrical container wears a mouth mask perhaps shaped as a serpent’s fanged upper jaw. It probably served in a tomb as a companion to a larger, more complex figural urn. Though termed "urns," these ceramics do not contain the cremated ashes of the dead but usually are found empty.

Provenance
?-1973
(Stendahl Art Galleries, Los Angeles, CA, 1973, sold to James C. and Florence C. Gruener)
1973-1990
James C. [1903-1990] and Florence C. [1908-1982] Gruener, Cleveland, OH, bequest to the Cleveland Museum of Art
1990
The Cleveland Museum of Art
Citations
Young-Sánchez, Margaret. "The Gruener Collection of Pre-Columbian Art." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 79, no. 7 (1992): 234-75. Reproduced and Mentioned: p. 250 www.jstor.org
Exhibition history

Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art; February 4 - November 29, 1992. "The Gruener Collection of Pre-Columbian Art." The Bulletin of The Cleveland Museum of Art. 79 (September, 1992.) cat. no. 53, p. 270, repr. fig. 53, p. 250.

The Gruener Collection of Pre-Columbian Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 4-November 29, 1992).

Source URL: https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1990.277