Description
An ancient and extremely rare kneeling female statuette, with a scarified face on the forehead and temples, arms folded over the belly. The head of this statuette, with a face with large eyes engraved in arcs and marked with emblematic scale scarifications, recalls the most beautiful okuyi masks of the Punu or mukuji of the Lumbu. It is distinguished, beyond its rarity, by a particularly successful hairstyle, with a curved central bun and three drooping braids treated in flat planes reminiscent of the hairstyle of the Punu statuette in the Vérité collection, and subdivided and highlighted by a superbly rhythmic geometric structure. The treatment of the shoulder blades is subtle and shows, like the ancient kaolin, a very beautiful ancient style. It is difficult to determine the precise use of this sculpture as it is part of a rare corpus. It is likely that it was placed next to or on a basket, an altar, as a guardian of a reliquary, or that it was linked to a protection rite, or to a specific request linked to fertility given the position of its arms. But it is difficult when discovering this sculpture not to immediately think of the famous lumbu statuette, guardian of a reliquary, formerly in the collections of the Musée de L'Homme, so rare is this type of sculpture. See, among other publications, for the lumbu reliquary guardian statuette formerly in the collections of the Musée de l'Homme and (renamed punu) in the collections of the Musée du Quai Branly, on the cover and p. 58 of the exhibition catalog: L'Idéal féminin dans l'art africain, Éd. Galeries Lafayette, 2001; or Lumbu, Un art sacré, Éd. Gourcuff-Gradenigo et Galerie Bernard Dulon, 2016, p. 141, fig. 31. Lumbu or Punu, Gabon Wood, old white (kaolin) and orange pigments, wear, small visible lack at one foot (old breakage), old oxidation and old patina. H. 22 cm Provenance : - M. Malraison - Dr. R. Taburet, acquired from the previous owner then transmitted by descent. Exhibitions and publication : - Art Noir exhibition, Musée de Brest, 1968, reproduced fig. 259 of the catalog. - Exhibition Regard sur l'Art Tribal, Crédit Mutuel de Bretagne de Brest, February-March 1999.
204
An ancient and extremely rare kneeling female statuette, with a scarified face on the forehead and temples, arms folded over the belly. The head of this statuette, with a face with large eyes engraved in arcs and marked with emblematic scale scarifications, recalls the most beautiful okuyi masks of the Punu or mukuji of the Lumbu. It is distinguished, beyond its rarity, by a particularly successful hairstyle, with a curved central bun and three drooping braids treated in flat planes reminiscent of the hairstyle of the Punu statuette in the Vérité collection, and subdivided and highlighted by a superbly rhythmic geometric structure. The treatment of the shoulder blades is subtle and shows, like the ancient kaolin, a very beautiful ancient style. It is difficult to determine the precise use of this sculpture as it is part of a rare corpus. It is likely that it was placed next to or on a basket, an altar, as a guardian of a reliquary, or that it was linked to a protection rite, or to a specific request linked to fertility given the position of its arms. But it is difficult when discovering this sculpture not to immediately think of the famous lumbu statuette, guardian of a reliquary, formerly in the collections of the Musée de L'Homme, so rare is this type of sculpture. See, among other publications, for the lumbu reliquary guardian statuette formerly in the collections of the Musée de l'Homme and (renamed punu) in the collections of the Musée du Quai Branly, on the cover and p. 58 of the exhibition catalog: L'Idéal féminin dans l'art africain, Éd. Galeries Lafayette, 2001; or Lumbu, Un art sacré, Éd. Gourcuff-Gradenigo et Galerie Bernard Dulon, 2016, p. 141, fig. 31. Lumbu or Punu, Gabon Wood, old white (kaolin) and orange pigments, wear, small visible lack at one foot (old breakage), old oxidation and old patina. H. 22 cm Provenance : - M. Malraison - Dr. R. Taburet, acquired from the previous owner then transmitted by descent. Exhibitions and publication : - Art Noir exhibition, Musée de Brest, 1968, reproduced fig. 259 of the catalog. - Exhibition Regard sur l'Art Tribal, Crédit Mutuel de Bretagne de Brest, February-March 1999.
