
Collection Online as of December 10, 2023
Gold, cast and hammered
Overall: 29.4 x 16.2 x 1 cm (11 9/16 x 6 3/8 x 3/8 in.)
Severance and Greta Millikin Purchase Fund 2015.1
233 Mesoamerican and Intermediate Region
Colombia's Tolima region is justly famous for arrestingly abstracted figures like this one, among the largest of its kind. Such figures, worn as necklace pendants by chiefs and other elites, seem to be based on the human form. But they also incorporate animal features, often an upturned, bifurcated tail sometimes compared to that of a serpent and large, angled head appendages that may refer to animal ears or even insect antennae.