A Senufo maternity

A Senufo maternity, Ivory Coast, seated on a four-legged stool, short legs leading to prominent buttocks, wearing bracelets around knees and ankles, a flaring pointed torso with a projecting navel and conical breasts, decorated with incised patterns made of lines, wearing bracelets around the upper arms and wrists, rounded shoulders with long arms holding two drinking children, notched back line, a cylindrical neck supporting an ovoid elongated head with a heart-shaped face, a protruding mouth with rows of teeth beneath a long nose leading to high arched brows, framed by large pierced coffee bean eyes, semicircular ears set towards the back of the head, incised scarification marks at the corners of the mouth, also at the forehead, capped by a striated crested hairstyle with a braid in front of the face and further braids on the sides and at the back of the head; heavy wood, dark brown patina with traces of age and ritual use, several holes and cracks.

Lit.: Burkhard Gottschalk: Senufo. Massa und die Statuen des Poro, Düsseldorf 2002; Kat. Ausst. Die Kunst der Senufo: Elfenbeinküste. Mit einem Beitrag von Till Förster, Staatliche Museen der Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Museum für Völkerkunde Berlin, 16.11.1990 - 24.2.1991, Berlin 1990; Die Kunst der Senufo, Museum Rietberg Zürich, aus Schweizer Sammlung, Zürich 1988; Homberger Lorenz: Künstler in Werkstätten der Senufo. In: Afrikanische Meister. Kunst der Elfenbeinküste, Zurüch 2014, p. 151-178; Wolfgang Jaenicke: Maternities West African Art.

1.000 - 1.200‚- Euro

Height: 63 cm

Weight: 5.6 kg