Figure of a Standing Warrior

A.D. 650/800

Late Classic Maya, Jaina
Campeche or Yucatán, Mexico

The costume and equipment of this figure indicate that he represents a warrior. He carries a rectangular shield and a long wooden spear (now lost), and the detailed attention given to the intricate headdress and facial features—marked by scarification, tattoos, and paint—suggests the portrait of a specific military commander.

Status: On View, Gallery 136
Department: Arts of the Americas

Culture: Maya
Title: Figure of a Standing Warrior
Place: Yucatan Peninsula (Object made in)
Date: 650 CE–800 CE
Medium: Ceramic with pigment
Dimensions: H.: 31.1 cm (12 1/4 in.)
Credit Line: African and Amerindian Art Purchase Fund, Edward E. Ayer Endowment in memory of Charles L. Hutchinson
Reference Number: 1963.272
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Allen Wardwell, Primitive Art in the Collections of the Art Institute of Chicago (Art Institute of Chicago, 1965), fig. 43 (ill.).
Allen Wardwell, “Mayan Treasures at the Art Institute of Chicago,” Apollo: The International Magazine of Arts (June 1972): 490, fig. 5.
Mary W. Helms, Middle America: A Culture History of Heartland and Frontiers (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1975), 87, fig. 6.3.
Richard F. Townsend and Kathleen Bickford Berzock, “The Art Institute of Chicago New Galleries,” in Tribal Arts XVI-1/62 (Winter 2011): 65, figure 13 (ill.).
Clare Kunny, “Leonora Carrington’s Mexican Vision,” Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies 22, no. 2 (1996): 166-179, fig. 9.
Richard Townsend with Elizabeth Pope, Indian Art of the Americas at the Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago and Yale University Press, 2016), 208, cat. 165 (ill.).

Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago’s Dream, A World’s Treasure: The Art Institute, 1893–1993, Nov. 1, 1993–Jan. 9. 1994, cat.

Everett D. Rassiga (died 2003), Black Tulip Galleries, Dallas, TX, by Mar. 1963 [permanent receipt RX4243, Mar. 18, 1963, copy in curatorial object file]; sold to the Art Institute, 1963.

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