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.

![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)

![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)


![George Inness and the Visionary Landscape [Hardcover] Bell, Adrienne Baxter](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/615PhhKthsL._SY342_-1.jpg)
![Frans Wildenhain 1950-75: Creative and Commercial American Ceramics at Mid-Century [Hardcover] Austin, Bruce A. and Profusely illustrated](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/71ZQm1MYQNL._SY425_-1-300x425.jpg)
![The Art of German Stoneware, 1300-1900: From the Charles W. Nichols Collection and the Philadelphia Museum of Art [Paperback] Hinton, Jack](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/61x0T1TJZWL._SY342_-1.jpg)
![Splendor, Myth, and Vision: Nudes from the Prado [Hardcover] Loughman, Thomas J.; Morris, Kathleen M.; Yeager-Crasselt, Lara; Burke, Jill and Portús, Javier](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/61GM3dFcJJL._SY425_-1-300x425.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)

![DESIRE AND DEVOTION: Art from India, Nepal, and Tibet [Paperback] Pal, Pratapaditya](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/8113YSWHw7L._SY342_-1.jpg)

![Creation Story: Gee's Bend Quilts and the Art of Thornton Dial (In Collaboration with Frist Art Museum) [Paperback] Scala, Mark W.](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/918E-4mmjAL._SY425_-1-300x425.jpg)

