Description
This masterful portrayal of a shaman's raptorial bird spirit form relies on a skillful integration of modeling and painting to achieve a convincing composition. The bird's head, including the raptor's deadly pointed beak, and the tips of its wings and tail are indicated by modeled flanges. The artist then painted details of wing and tail feathers as panels extending below the modeled forms to complete their renderings. The painted design on the vessel's pedestal support mimics the painted wings, thereby accentuating the avian identity of the effigy vessel. The sides of this extraordinary vessel are each painted with a human form. Their skillful integration into the bird's body reveals the true significance of the vessel as the depiction of a shaman's spirit form. Each of the two figures grasps a staff surmounted by a human skull, the staff perhaps making reference to the shaman's spiritual transformation being likened to death and rebirth.
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