The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of June 8, 2023

Offering Group: Plaque with Frontal and Profile Faces

800–1200(?)

Mexico, Guerrero(?), San Jerónimo de Juárez, Xochicalco style

Jadeite with albitite

Overall: 7.9 x 6.3 x 0.7 cm (3 1/8 x 2 1/2 x 1/4 in.)

Gift of Mr. and Mrs. James C. Gruener 1990.213

Location

not on view

Fun Fact

The red pigment may be cinnabar, the same mineral used to color Chinese lacquerware.

Description

This greenstone plaque is said to have been found inside a translucent stone vessel, together with two shells (1990.252.1–3). A similar offering was found in a pyramid ornamented with feathered serpents at Xochicalco, a site south of the Valley of Mexico.

Provenance
?-1966
(Stendahl Art Galleries, Los Angeles, CA, 1966, sold to James C. and Florence C. Gruener)
1966-1990
James C. [1903-1990] and Florence C. [1908-1982] Gruener, Cleveland, OH, bequest to the Cleveland Museum of Art
1990
The Cleveland Museum of Art
Citations
Von Winning, Hasso, and Alfred Stendahl. Pre-Columbian Art of Mexico and Central America: Text and Notes by Hasso Von Winning. Selection of Plates by Alfred Stendahl. New York: H.N. Abrams, 1968. p. 246, fig. 338
Young-Sánchez, Margaret. "The Gruener Collection of Pre-Columbian Art." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 79, no. 7 (1992): 234-75. Reproduced and Mentioned: p. 260 www.jstor.org
Exhibition history

Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art; February 4 - November 29, 1992. "The Gruener Collection of Pre-Columbian Art." The Bulletin of The Cleveland Museum of Art. 79 (September, 1992.) cat. no. 94, p. 273, repr. p. 260.

The Gruener Collection of Pre-Columbian Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 4-November 29, 1992).

Source URL: https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1990.213