"It has all these apertures almost as if it is breathing and hearing what is around it."
Curator Yaëlle Biro on "Seated Figure," a terracotta sculpture from the thirteenth century.
Explore this object:
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/314362
Throughout 2013, The Met invited curators from across the Museum to each talk about one artwork that changed the way they see the world.
Photography by Karin L. Willis
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What this object from a lost society tells us about a whole civilization
"It has all these apertures almost as if it is breathing and hearing what is around it."
Yaëlle Biro
2 min. watch
Contributors
Yaëlle Biro
Associate Curator, Department of the Arts of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas
Associate Curator, Department of the Arts of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas
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Middle Niger artist
13th century