Seated Figure Wearing a Skin
Unknown Artist
600–1000
Medium
earthenware, slip
Dimensions
43.3 × 29.2 × 28.7 cm
Classification
Sculpture
Department
Art of the Americas
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. James C. Gruener
Accession Number
1990.246
About this artwork
This type of image-showing a human clothed in a sacrificial victim’s skin, visible around the mouth and wrists-is one of the most awesome created by Mesoamerican artists. The figure represents the deity Xipe Totec or a human impersonator. Among the later Aztecs, Xipe was associated with fertility, rain, and renewal. Perhaps the wearer, upon shedding the skin, was conceived as a sprout emerging from a withered husk. Xipe also had military connections.