Sanxingdui

Sanxingdui is a walled settlement on the Yazi River in Guanghan. Its pits held bronze masks, a standing figure and objects that connect the Shu world with the Central Plains.

A bronze head from Sanxingdui
A bronze head from Sanxingdui

Sanxingdui

A bronze head from Sanxingdui

Masks that look past you

The bronze masks of Sanxingdui are not portraits. Their projecting eyes and wide mouths belong to a ritual world we can only partly read.

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Photo credits and rights
  1. A bronze head from SanxingduiGary Todd / CC0 · CC0 Photo source ↗ Rights information ↗ Orientation normalised, proportionally resized and encoded as WebP; no crop or retouch.