Online The Met Store Cycladic Head Sculpture

This strikingly abstract sculpture was reproduced from an intriguing marble head of a woman, of a type that represents the first flowering of marble sculpture in prehistoric Greece. The original head, made 2700–2500 B.C., is from the Cyclades, an island group in the Aegean Sea that’s rich in marble, emery, and obsidian. Inhabitants of these islands began to produce marble figures and vessels as early as 5000 B.C. Little is known about these figural sculptures, which are predominantly women; the frequency of female figures makes it likely they were related to fertility. The Met’s ancient sculpture displays traces of the eyes in extremely low relief, indicating they were formerly rendered with pigment.