Olmec 'Earth Monster' Illegally Taken to US Will Be Repatriated to Mexico
BY FRANCESCA ATON
April 4, 2023 2:44pm
Record of the Chalcaltzingo Project, 2008.
COURTESY MARIO CÓRDOVA
A huge carved Olmec statue has been recovered by Mexican officials, who believe the artifact was stolen decades ago, Mexico’s National Anthropology and History Institute (INAH) announced this past weekend.
Jorge Islas, the consul general of Mexico in New York, was notified that the work had been recovered by the antiquities trafficking unit of the Manhattan District Attorney’s office.
Mexico’s secretary of foreign affairs, Marcelo Ebrard, confirmed the news on Twitter, writing, “The Olmec piece most sought after by Mexico has been recovered and is about to return to its home, from where it should never have been stolen.”
Monument 9, as the statue has been called, measures roughly six feet tall and five feet wide, and weighs more than two thousand pounds. It originated from the prehistoric site Chalcatzingo in central Mexico, and likely dates back to the Middle Preclassic Period between 800–400 BCE.
More:
https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/olmec-earth-monster-artifact-repatriated-mexico-1234663110/
