A person becomes a container. The distinction between portrait and use starts to wobble.
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One object, two readings
This Rio Napo ceramic vessel, dated between the sixth and thirteenth centuries, takes the form of a seated man. It is both a representation of a body and an object intended to contain something.
A museum category can call it a vessel. That does not exhaust what it does to a viewer.
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The practical imagination
The work brings the human form into contact with daily activity. It does not separate art from usefulness because that separation is ours, not necessarily the maker's.
The strange part is how familiar the shape feels. A body can be a metaphor. Here it can also be an object you hold.
Vessel in the Form of a Seated Man, 6th–13th century. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Public-domain open access image.
Vessel in the Form of a Seated Man
Maker unknown · 6th–13th century
Ceramic · Ecuador / Río Napo
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
