The heads that make up this set have sophisticated coiffures; they were originally part of complete human figures. It is not known whether these small-format solid ceramic sculptures were broken intentionally by the society that made them, perhaps as part of a ritual or as a form of waste disposal. Another possibility is that the heads, like other parts of the body, such as the arms and legs, were separated from the torso, because the ts are fragile sections in three-dimensional objects, especially in this type of pottery. Such segmentation could have occurred during the centuries-long existence of the Chupícuaro culture to which they belong, or in later times.
Despite its fragmented state, its stylistic features or system of forms allow us to identify its affiliation to this Mesoamerican society, whose name was taken from a locality located in the Acámbaro Valley, in the southeast of Guanajuato. In addition to this area, the distribution of the Chupícuaro culture includes, in the same entity, the basin of Lake Cuitzeo. In Michoacán, it includes the Morelia Valley, and in Querétaro, the plains in the southern part of the state.
The slanted eyes and the abundant overlapping of small portions of clay to define the figure, a technique known as pastillage, are characteristic of the style called “slant eyes” by Muriel Noe Porter, who carried out archaeological investigations in the 1940s in the ancient settlement of Chupícuaro. It is worth noting that this figurative detail is concentrated on the front of the pieces, as the back is usually flat and plain.
The style is also known as Hiv in relation to a typology developed by George Vaillant in the 1930s, concerning small ceramic sculptures located in various sites in the central Highlands of Mexico and made during the Preclassic period. Vaillant pointed out that the Hiv type was common during the late Preclassic phase in Ticomán and Cuicuilco, and its presence extended to San Juan del Río, Querétaro, among other areas, in connection with the figures made in Chupícuaro.
As can be seen in other Chupicuareño-style “slant-eyed” works that make up the collection of Mesoamerican art housed by the Amparo Museum, for example those with registration numbers 172 and 813, the head dominates the visual composition of these images, which predominantly depict women. The large head, in relation to the total height of the pieces, suggests the modeling of the skull in the tabular erect variant.
The heads are also displayed with tall bejeweled hairstyles, leaving the circular ear pieces they also wear uncovered. The ornamentation on the heads is outstanding in its variety and sophistication, giving individuality to the human figures, in contrast to the simple and standardized facial features seen in the heads of the set.
In these, the hair appears with the recurrent hairstyle with a center parting, and the hairstyles are also adorned with bands and circular objects.
Another feature to be emphasized in these attractive heads is that in the second one, the ornament is different on each side of the central separation: on the right side there are circular ornaments, and on the left side there are reliefs of straight locks of hair.
It is worth mentioning that the busy and creative hairstyles and headdresses of these sculptural images bear witness to their polysemic and multifunctional importance; beauty, identity, hierarchy, religiosity, ritual and power may have been interwoven in their creation and execution.
