Human Figures

The Metropolitan Museum has a wide variety of artworks that depict human figures. These artworks come from all over the world and span many different cultures and periods of history. The human figure has been a popular subject for artists throughout the ages, and the artworks in The Metropolitan Museum provide a glimpse into how different cultures have represented the human form.

Standing Figure with Feathered Headdress

    The ornamented headdress, arms, and rich vestments of this figure suggests that figures like this one most likely represent a sovereign's personal guard, viziers or amirs.
    Probably meant to decorate the reception hall of a ruler's court, be it the Seljuk sultan or one of his local vassals or successors, they would parallel and enhance actual ceremonies in the very setting in which they took place.
    Recent analyses have proven that a traditionally-made gypsum plaster is consistently employed on these figures and on archaeological stuccoes.
    The figures also display integrated restoration of the first half of the twentieth century, including additions in a more refined gypsum, and modern pigments (some of the reds and synthetic ultramarine blue).

Views of Vienna

    The light screen consists of four leaves, each consisting of two topographical views of Vienna, identified by inscriptions beneath, in translucent enamels on glass.
    The light screen is set into a frame of blond wood trimmed with darker wood.
    The frame has a wood panel in the lowest register set with a framed, mother-of-pearl, shaped cartouche.

Stela of the Overseer of the Fortress Intef

    The stela proclaims the name of King Nebhepetre Mentuhotep II ca.
   2051 - 2000 B C., the founder of the Middle Kingdom.
    In the same line, the Stella's owner, Intef, refers to himself as "his (the king's) servant."

A Road in Louveciennes

    This picture, which is in effect drawn directly with paint, was almost certainly executed out-of-doors about 1870.
    The site is in the village of Louveciennes, west of Paris, where Camille Pissarro lived and worked in 1869-70 and was inspired to paint the same motif, but from a different vantage point (National Gallery, London).
    At the time, Renoir was staying nearby with his parents, who had retired to Voisins.

Interior of the Oude Kerk, Delft

    This painting is a realistic depiction of the inside of the Oude Kerk in Delft.
    The painting takes some liberties with the architecture of the church.
    There are a lot of religious paintings and sculptures in the church, but they have been destroyed during the Iconoclasm.