Joseph (from a nativity)

Ecuadorian and Philippine

On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 774


This Nativity group was assembled in a Quito, Ecuador, workshop. Mary’s and Joseph’s bodies are made of locally carved and painted wood, but their ivory faces were imported from the Philippines, as was the ivory figure of the infant Christ. During the final decades of the eighteenth century, in response to the easing of trade restrictions, Quito artists scaled up production of works of this type for export to the broader Spanish-American market.

Joseph (from a nativity), Wood, polychromed and gilded; ivory touched up with polychromy (face and shoulders), Ecuadorian and Philippine

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