Statue, Bamana, Mali Wood Height: 54 cm Provenance: Pierre Vérité Collection, Paris Pierre Vérité Collection, Paris Olivier Castellano, Paris Dr. Adelheid Wurzer, Munich Adrian Schlag, Brussels Private collection, France Richard Vinatier Collection, Avignon (inv. no. 279) The remarkable dynamic of the volumes, inscribed in geometric forms, offering the eye an almost cubist rendering, the delicacy and finesse of the scarifications invading the body and the dark, shiny patina, bring to a climax the expression of feminine beauty in southern Bamana country, while incontestably testifying to the degree of ingenuity of Mali's artists, inspiring the greatest modernists. Living in Mali to the south-east of Dogon territory, the Bamana, who have a particular devotion to their ancestors, are organized around an initiation society called Jo. This social structure, inseparable from religion, is based on each individual's membership of a secret society. "Used during septennial initiations and carried from village to village by the initiates, [the statues] are part of the exhibition of Jo values" (Salia Malé in Colleyn, 2002: 154). Among the corpus of objects linked to Jo cults, female Jonyeleni (little Jo Nyele) statues like this one are essential. They represent the materialization of the soul of the female entity at the origin of creation. Their symbolic power is matched by their magnified beauty, with its schematic, sensual, rhythmic plasticity. Embodying the ideal woman, fertile and "at her most physically attractive" - with firm, generous conical breasts, rounded buttocks and narrow hips - to which Jo initiates can aspire at the end of their initiation. Called nyeleniou ("little nyele" literally meaning "pretty little one" or "little ornament"), a name frequently given to an award-winning girl, these statues represent the ideal qualities of nubile girls. The slender, refined torso, prominent hips and buttocks, and protruding breasts allude to fertility, which is exacerbated. This ideal beauty is enhanced by the engraved ornamentation on the arms, indicating adornment, and by the finely engraved chevron-shaped scarification marks on the abdomen, back and head - such as once adorned the bodies of adolescent girls, while the dark, shiny patina, according to Kate Ezra (1986: 17), evokes the bodies of Bamana girls preparing for dances. cf. Colleyn (2002: 155, cat. 137) By displaying such a figure, an initiate announces his desire to meet potential brides. See Vogel, Susan, Art/artifact. African Art in Anthropology Collections, New York, The Center for African Art, 1988, p. 42, for a statue in the former Charles Ratton collection of the Buffalo Museum of Science Science (C12758).