Female figurine of the Plastiras type
marble
Cycladic
Early Cycladic I period - Pelos phase
3200-2800 BC

H.: 10.2 cm
Unknown provenance

Description
Early example or a precursor of the Plastiras type. The long ovoid head is crowned by a conical cap, the arms are folded below the chest and the legs are carved n the round. The pubic triangle is rendered by incision while the small breasts are modelled.

Figurines of the "Plastiras type", thus named after the cemetery on Paros where they were first identified, were contemporary with violin-shaped figurines and represent the earliest attempt at the naturalistic rendering of the human figure in the third millennium BC. These figurines, which are mainly female and of small dimensions (h. 7-31 cm.), display some of those features that were subsequently to develop into distinctive traits of Cycladic figurines, such as the position of the arms below the breasts and the ovoid head with relief nose. However, the sculptors had not yet conquered the abstraction of the mature period of Cycladic art and instead cleaved to a markedly naturalistic conception, which is particularly pronounced in the treatment of the pelvic area, the pubic triangle and the legs.

Typologically, the Plastiras type figurines are a development of the steatopygous figures of the Late Neolithic period (5300-3200 BC). The conical cap with horizontal grooves occurs on both male and female figures of the late Early Cycladic I period and the transitional phase to Early Cycladic II, and is considered to echo Eastern (Syrian) influences, perhaps in combination with influences from the Balkans.