On view
Ancient Mediterranean Art
Female Figure,
late 6th century BCE
Greek, Attic
y1944-67
Tanagra figurines like this one can be traced to a cemetery near the Boeotian city of Tanagra, in central Greece. The red-clay figures were generally made in molds and then coated with white slip and painted. Traces of red and blue pigments are still visible on the white in this example. The woman stands heavily draped with her himation, or mantle, wrapped snuggly around her head, framing her delicate facial features. She looks down and to the right but lifts her gaze slightly, as though acknowledging someone, a slight smile about her lips. The broad contours of her body are visible through the drapery, which in some places is pulled taut and in others hangs in folds, a torsional counterpoint that is a hallmark of Tanagra figurines and suggests a powerful sense of movement.
Information
Title
Female Figure
Dates
late 6th century BCE
Medium
Terracotta
Dimensions
22.0 x 6.2 x 4.5 cm (8 11/16 x 2 7/16 x 1 3/4 in.)
Credit Line
Museum purchase
Object Number
y1944-67
Culture
Type
Materials
Subject
Purchased from the Simkhovitch Collection in 1944.
- "Recent acquisitions", Record of the Museum of Historic Art, Princeton University 4, no. 1 (1945): p. 11., p. 11
- Richard Nicholls, "Two groups of Archaic Attic terracottas", in Donna Kurtz and Brian Sparkes, eds., The eye of Greece: studies in the art of Athens, (Cambridge, UK; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1982)., p. 108, no. A3-1
