Zapotec Pottery Sculpture

CLAY and its wiles have been left severely alone by many of the sculptors who are trying to restore sculpture as a masculine art. The soft sweetnesses of sculpture before the war have somehow brought the medium, as well as the men who used it, a reputation for sentimentality. Yet clay in the form of terra cotta has greater capacities for energetic and forceful treatment than almost any other medium. It was used with great effectiveness by the pre-Columbian artists of America and especially in the work of the Zapotecs, reached a unique pitch of power that is worth notice in an age that worships energy.