Etruscan Bronze Statuette of a Slave in the Getty Villa, June 2016

Title: Statuette of a Seated African Boy

Artist/Maker: Unknown

Culture: Etruscan

Place: Populonia, Etruria (Place created)

Date: 450–425 B.C.

Medium: Bronze

Object Number: 96.AC.128

Dimensions: 5.7 × 3.3 × 3.1 cm (2 1/4 × 1 5/16 × 1 1/4 in.)

Credit Line: Gift of Barbara and Lawrence Fleischman

Alternate Titles: Finial with a Sleeping Boy (Display Title)

Object Type: Male figure

Resting his head in his hand, a young boy sits curled up on the ground. Through the rendering of hair and facial features, the artist characterized him as an African. The artist also carefully portrayed his poor physical and emotional condition: hunched back, prominent ribs, and dejected posture.

Etruscan traders and sailors would have encountered Africans in their overseas trading. The Etruscans also kept slaves, some of whom were probably African, as the boy in this statue appears to be. Yet, most Etruscans would never have seen an African, and thus they played the role of infrequent, exotic curiosities in Etruscan art. The form of the statuette's base suggests that this figure once decorated the top of a candelabrum.


Text from: www.getty.edu/art/collection/objects/29510/unknown-maker-statuette-of-a-seated-african-boy-etruscan-450-425-bc