bold decor

A unique fusion of Maya and Toltec styles, the chac mool depicts a reclining person holding a bowl. The first such figures were discovered in the late 1800s in a number of sites in Yucatán. Thought to depict sacrificial victims, the bowls received offerings to the gods – perhaps even human hearts. Angel Cerón recreates the enigmatic image in an exquisite ceramic sculpture.

Working in clay, artisans from the Angel Cerón Artisan Association depict the intense features of Huehueteotl, the first god of the Aztecs. One of the most respected, he is the old god, the god of fire, the god that gave rise to the other deities in the pre-Hispanic pantheon. On his head, a tray holds glowing embers while his wrinkled visage attest to the god's great age.

Artisans from the Angel Cerón Artisan Association handcraft a ceramic replica of an Aztec calendar that will make an intriguing conversation piece wherever it is displayed. A replica of the Piedra del Sol, the "sun stone," found in the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City, the images in the calendar represent the legend of the fifth sun. According to Mesoamerican cosmology, there were four suns before our current sun, all destroyed, along with the people of the time, by the wrath of the gods. Faithful to the original, the replica is full of intricate detail and painted in warm, earthy yellow, orange, green, and beige. A sueded leather cord makes a loop at the top for easy hanging.

Baying at the moon, this plump little dog with wrinkled skin replicates those found in shaft tombs throughout western Mexico. Artisans from the Angel Cerón Artisan Association depict the xoloitzcuintli, a cheerful, barkless species prized by ancient man. Sculpted in clay as funerary offerings, they accompanied their masters in death to aid the soul in crossing rivers of blood along the road of the dead. This is a replica of a museum piece from Comala, Colima.