Large Nayarit Seated Female Figure, Lagunillas Type D, Protoclassic, circa 100 BC - AD 250

John Huston, St Clerans, Craughwell, County Galway, and California, acquired during the 1940s - 1970s
Andy Williams, California, acquired from the above on June 25, 1985
Andy and Deborah Williams, California

With her tapering legs outstretched and hands resting on her knees, this female conveys empowered confidence by her serene and meditative expression. This trait is particularly strong in the Lagunillas Type D female figures of Nayarit.  Her body ornamentation that indicates her status and lineage includes distinctive striped designs on her face and torso, and raised cicatrice tattoos on her shoulders.  She wears earrings and three necklaces as well as bracelets on her proper left arm. A beaded string accentuates the figure's hips, while a dark loincloth has been painted directly beneath it. 

For the type of figure in the Proctor Stafford Collection, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, see Michael Kan, Clement Meighan, H. B. Nicholson, Sculpture of Ancient West Mexico: Nayarit, Jalisco, Colima, The Proctor Stafford Collection, Los Angeles, 1970 (reprinted 1989), p. 74, cat. no. 3. See also the seated female in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York,  in Kristi Butterwick, Heritage of Power: The Andrall E. Pearson Family Collection, New York, 2004, p. 89, cat. no. 41.