Currently not on view
Tecomate with serpent,
1200–900 BCE
Olmec Style Ceramics
Beginning about 1200 b.c., stylistically similar ceramic vessels and figurines appear across much of Mesoamerica. Both white-slipped, fleshy figures—some incorporating features of infants—and vessels carved with recurring stylized motifs indicate widespread awareness of the complex civilization developing on Mexico’s Gulf Coast at San Lorenzo, the primary Olmec center from 1200 to 900 b.c. and the point of origin of these forms. Confusingly, the term "Olmec" has been applied both to the coastal culture and to the artistic style that appears in so many other parts of Mesoamerica.Information
1200–900 BCE
North America, Mexico, Puebla, Las Bocas
<p> December 26, 1968, George Pepper (1913-1969), Mexico City, Mexico, sold to Gillett G. Griffin (1928-2016), Princeton, NJ [1]; January 19, 2016, donative sale to Princeton University Art Museum. </p> <p> Notes: <br> [1] According to Gillett G. Griffin Notebook 1-8. </p>
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<p>Lin Deletaille, Emile Deletaille, and H. van Geluwe, <em>Schatten uit de Nieuwe Wereld</em>, (Brussels: Royal Museum of Art and History, Brussels, 1992)</p> , cat. no. 79
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<p>Peter David Joralemon, "A Study of Olmec Iconography" in <em>Studies in Pre-Columbian Art and Archaeology</em> No. 7, (1971): 1–95</p>, fig. 251 (illus. line drawing)
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Gerald Berjonneau, Emile Deletaille, and Jean-Louis Sonnery, <em>Rediscovered Masterpieces of Mesoamerica: Mexico-Guatemala-Honduras</em> (Boulogne: Editions Arts, 1985)., cat. no. 49 (illus.)
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Franz Feuchtwanger, <em>Cerámica Olmeca</em> (Mexico, D.F.: Editorial Patria, 1989)., cat. no. 117
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Harmer Johnson, ed. <em>Guide to the Arts of the Americas</em> (New York: Rizzoli, 1992), p. 81 (illus.)
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<p>Lin Crocker-Deletaille and Emile Deletaille, <em>Tresors du nouveau monde</em> (Brussels: Royal Museum of Art and History, 1992).</p>, fig. 99 (illus.)
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Michael D. Coe et al., <em>The Olmec World: Ritual and Rulership</em> (Princeton, Princeton University Art Museum, 1996), cat. no. 110, p. 215 (illus.)
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<p>"Acquisitions of the Princeton University Art Museum 2016," <em>Record of the Art Museum, Princeton University</em> 75/76 (2016-17): 126-157.</p>, p. 147
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