Most of the faces in Egyptian art are youthful and idealized—especially those depicting women. But here, Queen Tiye, the mother of Akhenaten, shows signs of aging. Look at the deep furrows around her mouth, and the flesh sagging over her cheeks. But the Queen is still a remarkably beautiful woman. The sculptor has treated her image with a great deal of respect. And what a strong personality! Queen Tiye was an important person during the reign of her husband, Amenhotep the Third. And she continued to be influential after her son, Akhenaten, assumed the throne.

Akhenaten’s reign was an eventful time. He rejected the pantheon of Egyptian deities in favor of a single god, often referred to as the Aten. Aten is the Egyptian word for the sun disk itself. Akhenaten's god was not the sun as we see it in the sky, but the power of light which comes into the world through the sun disk. Light is a fairly abstract deity. But at the same time, he is a god of the visible and the tangible. In contrast, traditional Egyptian religion stressed the invisible, mysterious character of the gods.

Akhenaten’s understanding of the divine had far-reaching consequences for the art of his time. The seventeen years of his rein are usually called the Amarna Period, after the site where Akhenaten built his new residence. The artists of the Amarna Period developed one of the most sensitive and subtly realistic styles of ancient art. This head embodies that realism impressively. The bones of the skull are subtly indicated below the soft flesh of the face. And there is a strong impression that light was a dominant factor in the creation of this piece. Not the illusionstic light of Western art, but the overwhelming brightness of the Egyptian sun. Beneath its rays, all objects stand out in unremitting clarity.