Art of the Ancient Americas

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The Olmec civilization, which flourished in the coastal lowland states of Veracruz and Tabasco between 1200 and 400 B.C., provided the philosophical, political, and artistic foundations upon which later Mesoamerican civilizations were based. The brilliant conception and superb craft of Olmec style art and architecture, found at the great ceremonial complexes of San Lorenzo, La Venta, and Tres Zapotes, include pyramids, monumental stone sculptures, and exquisitely carved jades. The legacy of the Olmec style is found throughout Mesoamerica, as far south as Costa Rica, in monumental and portable art.

This powerful figure, portraying both human and jaguarian features, represents a shaman or a divine ruler undergoing transformation to a supernatural state. The figure does not wear a mask but actually is, beneath his human form, a jaguar: the skin and hair on the head have been peeled back to expose his feline nature. The supernatural qualities of the figure were originally enhanced by glowing eyes, inlaid with pyrite.

The Olmec cosmos was divided into three realms: the watery underworld, on which the earth floats; the terrestrial level, where people live and crops grow; and the celestial realm of the birds and heavenly bodies. Shamans gained access to these worlds through meditation and ingestion of hallucinogens, transforming and transporting themselves between earthly and supernatural worlds. Jaguars, who live in caves and are equally at home on land and in water, were associated with acts of transformation because of their ability to move between the cosmic realms of earth and the watery Underworld.

This large, hollow figure comes from the present-day state of Jalisco, located on the Pacific coast of West Mexico. Between 200 B.C. and A.D. 500, the inhabitants of Jalisco and the nearby states of Nayarit and Colima constructed elaborate underground shaft-and-chamber tombs, which are unique in Mexico. Among the various burial offerings placed in these tombs were large, hollow ceramic figures and vessels, and such smaller objects as stone implements, shell trumpets, and obsidian mirrors. Because little monumental architecture and no writing systems from this region have survived, our knowledge of these ancient cultures comes from the burials and their contents. Unfortunately, few burials have been excavated by archaeologists, therefore, much historical information about the people of ancient West Mexico has been lost.

This warrior figure, which may have served as a tomb guardian, is the largest known example of funerary sculpture from West Mexico. Made in one piece, it is a tour de force of firing. The figure wears a caplike helmet with spikes; a stiff, leather vest; and short trousers. He raises a painted rod, possibly a club or baton signifying his rank. The red-slipped brown clay and polychrome decoration, protruding stomach, and pellets of clay on the figure's shoulders, representing scarified tissue, characterize the El Arenal Brown type of West Mexican sculpture.