Description
From the first millennium B.C. until the arrival of Europeans in the 16th century, artists from across the ancient Americas created small-scale architectural effigies to be placed in the tombs of important individuals. These works in stone, ceramic, wood, and metal range from highly abstracted, minimalist representations of temples and houses to elaborate complexes populated with figures, conveying a rich sense of ancient ritual and daily life. Although described as models, these effigies were created not so much as reflections or prototypes of existing structures, but rather as critical, conceptual components of funerary practice and beliefs about an afterlife.


![Casting a Shadow: Creating the Alfred Hitchcock Film [Paperback] Schmenner, Will and Granof, Corinne](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/81D2s-ypoAL._SY466_-1-300x450.jpg)

![Angels and Wild Things: The Archetypal Poetics of Maurice Sendak [Paperback] Cech, John](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/91YTCMrs8jL._SY385_.jpg)

![In the Courts of Religious Ladies: Art, Vision, and Pleasure in Italian Renaissance Convents [Hardcover] Periti, Giancarla](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/71cbGJd7edL._SY342_-1.jpg)
![Ancient Bronzes through a Modern Lens: Introductory Essays on the Study of Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Bronzes [Paperback] Ebbinghaus, Susanne; Anderson, Lisa; Bewer, Francesca G.; Bielfeldt, Ruth; Eremin, Katherine; Hemingway, Seán; Lie, Henry; Mattusch, Carol C.; Riederer, Josef and Staehli, Adrian](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/516k-q2VTKL._SY385_-1.jpg)
![The Wyvern Collection: Medieval and Later Ivory Carvings and Small Sculpture [Hardcover] Williamson, Paul](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/61YR4fz0JsL._SY466_-1-300x450.jpg)
![Panaesthetics: On the Unity and Diversity of the Arts (The Anthony Hecht Lectures in the Humanities Series) [Hardcover] Albright, Daniel](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/71tyEo5BxYL._SY385_-1.jpg)
![Stuart Walker: Modernist Master Revealed (A Retrospective Exhibition) [Paperback] Payne, Aaron; Stuart Walker](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/91lyPzkoVL._SY342_-1-300x342.jpg)



![Make It New: Abstract Painting from the National Gallery of Art, 19501975 [Paperback] Cooper, Harry; Breslin, David and Jolly, Matt](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/61i1k-PWaAL._SY522_-1-300x450.jpg)
![California Design Biennial 2003 Pasadena Museum of California Art (California Design Biennial, 2003) [Paperback] Wesley Jessup](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/81eFQUbQhbL._SY385_-1.jpg)
![LA PRESENCIA:Latin American Art in the United States [Paperback] (various authors)](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/A1LIfbkQAkL._SY385_-1-300x385.jpg)
![The Kaufmann Collection: The Early Furniture of Gustav Stickley [Hardcover] Thomas K. Maher](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/11qAK05MfkL-1.jpg)
![2G 25 Josep Lluís Mateo, International Architechture Review (2G, 25) [Paperback] Wilfried Wang; Aaron Betsky; Manuel Delgado; Akos Moravánski and Ignasi de Solà-Morales](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/31X61SEGVPL-1.jpg)