Bowl with Costumed Being (100 BCE–700 CE): Art, History and Details

Bowl with Costumed Being (100 BCE–700 CE) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Supernatural figures like the one on this bowl are shown wearing ornaments that actually exist-like the nearby Mouth Mask-they may represent humans clothed as deities who served as living cult images during rituals. The figure holds a severed head that probably alludes to capture of an enemy’s life force, since severed heads and fertility are linked in Nasca art.

Object facts

• Title: Bowl with Costumed Being
• Date: 100 BCE–700 CE
• Culture: Peru, South Coast, Nasca
• Type: Ceramic
• Technique: earthenware with colored slips
• Dimensions: Diameter: 12.8 x 17.7 cm (5 1/16 x 6 15/16 in.); Overall: 13 cm (5 1/8 in.)
• Collection: AA - Andes
• Department: Art of the Americas
• Accession number: 1949.561

Collection credit

Gift of John Wise

Further reading listed by the museum

• Foote, Helen. "Early Peruvian Pottery." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 37, no. 3 (March 1950): 54-56.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.