The visual arts of the Maya civilization manifested  in a wide array of  subjects, materials and techniques, including ceramics, wood carvings,  stucco modeling,  murals or wall paintings, and stone sculpture.

Maya Culture

Head Of A Dignitary

600 – 950 CE (Late Classic), Honduras

Basalt

9.5 x 6.5 x 5.5 inches

Provenance:

Private collection, California, 2015
Ptivate collection, California, 2001
Collection of Monika and Erich Neusbauer, California, 1975

Art Loss Register certificate, June 2016

The visual arts of the Maya civilization –  a Mesoamerican culture made up of a  number of small kingdoms in what is now Mexico, Guatemala, Belize and Honduras –  manifested  in a wide array of  subjects, materials and techniques, including ceramics, wood carvings,  stucco modeling,  murals or wall paintings, and stone  sculpture.

With a population ranging in the millions and scattered throughout a vast region, the Maya were organized into small independent kingdoms or, more accurately, into city states. Each city state was ruled by a divine lord or ajaw/ahau who controlled territory around the capital city and frequently fought with neighboring states for preeminence. Political and economic rivalries among the Maya lords were fueled by an interest in acquiring territory and controlling trade routes—activities made more complicated by the remoteness of many Maya cities as well as their diverse geographies (Maya cities could be found in lowland rainforests and mountainous highlands). 

Different from the later Aztec, who centralized power and created a true empire, Maya power remained de-centralized and was spread throughout numerous kingdoms.

The collapse of Maya cities in the tenth century is not fully understood but may have resulted from complex factors including climate change (and resulting drought and crop failures), overpopulation, and political unrest. 

Historians divide Maya history into three periods:

• Pre-Classic: 2000 BCE-250 CE
• Classic: 250-950 CE
• Post-Classic: 950-1524 CE

The Classic Period is divided into Early Classic: 250-550 CE and Late Classic: 600-950 CE.

Sculpture for the ancient Maya spans all media, from the miniature to the monumental, as artists gave shape to materials extracted from the landscape.

Maya art forms tend to be more stiffly organized during the Early Classic (250-550 CE) and to become more expressive during the Late Classic phase (550-950 CE). In the course of history, influences of various other Mesoamerican cultures were absorbed, born from the interaction between societies in the Yucatan Peninsula and those of the Mexican Gulf Coast, known as the Olmec civilization.  In the late Preclassic, the influence of the Olmec style is still discernible, whereas in the Early Classic, the style of central Mexican Teotihuacan made itself felt, just as that of the Toltec in the Postclassic.

For the Classic Period of the central Maya area, stone sculpture manifested in several forms, including stelae ( large, elongated stone slabs usually covered with carvings and inscriptions, and often accompanied by round altars); lintels, panels, and relief columns; thrones and benches; large zoomorphs;  and three-dimensional works (stone sculpture in the round).

This stone head is from Honduras, from the Late Classic period ( 600-950 CE). Since the eyelids are closed, it is probably a grave decoration of a deceased dignitary.