1993.81 Seated hunchback holding mirror (Olmec, Las Bocas, Puebla, Mexico)

Objects that are Olmec in style have been found in such distant areas of Mesoamerica as Tlapacoya and Tlatilco in the Valley of Mexico, Chalcatzingo in Morelos, and Teopantecuanitlan in Guerrero. The relationship between the regional cultures that made or used these items and the Olmec archaeological culture of the Gulf Coast, which is often described as the Olmec heartland, is more debated than understood. The site of Las Bocas, near the modern town of Izúcar de Matamoros in western Puebla, is also a source of ceramics in the Olmec style: blackware bottles and bowls deeply incised with Olmec symbols, animal effigy vessels, hollow babylike figures, and small solid figures with polished white slip.

These deftly modeled miniatures epitomize the refined naturalism of the Las Bocas style (1993.80; 1993.81). Physical deformity is a recurring theme in Mesoamerican art, and a number of Olmec-style objects depict hunchbacks and dwarves, whom the Olmec accorded special status and associated with the supernatural world. Each figure holds an object for which Olmec scholar F. Kent Reilly III has provided a tentative identification. The seated hunchback holds what is probably a mirror (1993.81). Actual Olmec mirrors are made of iron ore (magnetite, ilmenite, or hematite), with a highly polished concave surface that both reflects and inverts an image. It is possible that the Olmec, like later Mesoamerican cultures, used mirrors as tools for shamanic divination and considered them portals to the supernatural world. The reclining hunchback holds a rectangular object that may be a container for pigments used for body painting (1993.80).  It might also be a ritual implement, possibly a celt, or stone ax head. Associated with agriculture and maize, celts figured prominently in Olmec ritual and were often deposited in caches.

Pre-Columbian (American): AAT: 300016619

Olmec: AAT: 300017051

Mexico (nation): TGN: 7005560

Puebla (state): TGN: 7005592

Izúcar de Matamoros (inhabited place): TGN: 1017611

Las Bocas (deserted settlement / Puebla): DMA

ceramic (material): AAT: 300235507

clay: AAT: 300010439

resin (organic material): AAT: 300012882

paint (coating): AAT: 300015029

glazing (coating): AAT: 300053914

incising: AAT: 300053847

slip (clay): AAT: 300010459

slip glaze: AAT: 300015110

coiling (pottery technique): AAT: 300053903

modeling (forming): AAT: 300053130

firing (technique): AAT: 300053887

Middle Preclassic Period (Formative): AAT: 300016973

Formative Period (Preclassic): AAT: 300016973

sculpture: AAT: 300047090

figurine: AAT: 300047455

funerary objects: AAT: 300234126

effigies (funerary sculpture): AAT: 300047108

celts (cutting tools): AAT: 300251881

mirrors: AAT: 300037682

dwarfs (dwarfism / people / condition): AAT: 300236748

hunchbacks (kyphosis / people / condition): DMA

physical deformity (condition): DMA

miniature (size): AAT: 300121995

Seated hunchback holding rectangular object (1993.80) 

Until 1993: Carolyn C. (d. 2010) and Dan C. Williams, Dallas [1]

1985-1993: Dallas Museum of Art, on long-term loan from the above, received from Ancient Art of the New World, Inc. (John Menser, dealer), New York, on September 09, 1985 [1]

From 1993: Dallas Museum of Art, gift of Carolyn C. and Dan C. Williams, December 22, 1993 [1], [2]

[1] The main source for this provenance are Incoming Loan Agreements (dated April 3, 1992, September 11, 1989, and October 26, 1985, copies in Dallas Museum of Art Collections Records Object File). Exceptions and other supporting documents are noted.

[2] The main source for this provenance is Deed of Gift from Carolyn C. and Dan C. Williams (dated December 22, 1993, copy in Dallas Museum of Art Collections Records Object File). Exceptions and other supporting documents are noted.

SET OPERATOR AS OR

Apply to objects where number equals 1993.81

apply to OBJECTS where id equals 5337566