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Seated figure

13th century
On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 341
This haunting figure huddles with its leg hugged to its chest and its head dropped on its knee. It simultaneously suggests the knotted tension of anxiety and the sublime absorption of deep prayer. Created over 700 years ago, in the Inland Niger Delta region of present-day Mali, this elegant work's intense emotional immediacy blurs the boundaries of time and place.

This terracotta sculpture comes from a site called Jenne-jeno, the oldest known city in sub-Saharan Africa. Jenne-jeno flourished in the ninth century A.D., but declined and was abandoned by 1400. Items of cast brass and forged iron, clay vessels, and figures like this one survive. They testify to what scholars contend was a richly varied and highly sophisticated urban society.

A few controlled archaeological digs provide only the vaguest outlines of the original significance of the art of this time and region. Recovered terracotta figures are frequently quite detailed. They include jewelry, clothing, and body ornaments such as the parallel columns of bumps and circles on the back of this work. Sometimes they cover the entire body and seem to represent the pustules of some dreadful illness.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Seated figure
  • Artist: Middle Niger artist
  • Date: 13th century
  • Geography: Mali, Inland Niger Delta region
  • Culture: Middle Niger civilization
  • Medium: Terracotta
  • Dimensions: H. 10 × W. 9 3/4 × D. 11 3/4 in. (25.4 × 24.8 × 29.8 cm)
  • Classification: Ceramics-Sculpture
  • Credit Line: Purchase, Buckeye Trust and Mr. and Mrs. Milton F. Rosenthal Gifts, Joseph Pulitzer Bequest and Harris Brisbane Dick and Rogers Funds, 1981
  • Object Number: 1981.218
  • Curatorial Department: The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing

Audio

Cover Image for 1540. Seated Figure

1540. Seated Figure

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