Terracotta Vase in the Form of a Black African's Head in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, December 2022

Title: Terracotta vase in the form of a Black African youth's head

Artist: Attributed to the Negro Boy Group

Period: Classical

Date: 4th century BCE

Culture: Etruscan

Medium: Terracotta

Dimensions: H. 9 in. (22.9 cm)

Classification: Vases

Credit Line: Rogers Fund, 1903

Accession Number: 03.3.1

The sensitively rendered statuette depicts a Black African youth wearing wrapped around his waist a tunic, the distinctive garment characteristic of artisans, especially those working in the heat of a foundry, forge, or brazier. The medium of the bronze, which once would have been tinted black, works in tandem with the youth’s tight curls and facial features to indicate the physical appearance of a Black African individual. In the Hellenistic period, a greater diversity of people lived and worked together in Greek cities, and depictions of Black African individuals as artists, scholars, athletes, servants, and enslaved people point to their range of stations and occupations within society.

Text from: www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/246978