ETHAF 044412

statuette masculine d'ancêtre

Back to results
044412
Biteki ancestor figure
Congo, Niari valley, Mouyondzi district
Beembe (Bembe). Late 19th - early 20th century
Wood
Gift of the painter Émile Chambon in 1981
MEG Inv. ETHAF 044412
Geolocate the object
Cette figure d’ancêtre beembe tient un couteau dans la main droite et un fusil dans la main gauche. Ces attributs renvoient au pouvoir temporel du chef sur ses sujets; la pose de cette figurine d’ancêtre est comparable à celle que l’on retrouve dans les figurations de Chibinda Ilunga, l’ancêtre mythique des Chokwe, qui porte toujours un bâton et un fusil. Le fusil est l’arme par excellence de la traite des esclaves et du développement du commerce de longue distance. C’est lui qui a permis le développement et la consolidation aux 18e et 19e des grands royaumes de la côte ouest de l’Afrique centrale. Autrefois jugés trop « modernes » par certains collectionneurs et marchands, qui voyaient en eux des éléments iconographiques « tardifs », les fusils figurés dans ces sculptures ont parfois été sciés !

Boris Wastiau

The image above is subject to copyright.
Copyrights for Photographic Reproduction

Central Africa

Central Africa has countless facets and only a few are shown here through sculptures, ritual instruments, weapons and watercolours. In this immense territory, once controlled by powerful African kingdoms, court arts and rituals were asphyxiated first by the slave trade and then by colonisation. In Europe, the public shuddered at the sight of "nail fetishes" and were moved by the drawings of Congolese artists.

Receptacles for the Powers from the Hereafter

Of all the ritual objects in the Kongo cultural area, the mikondi "nail fetishes" perhaps most deeply marked the Europeans when they discovered Africa. Considered to be violent figures used in witchcraft, they fanned fantasies of an Africa of deep forests, plunged in obscurantism. Literally inhabited by a spirit, these anthropomorphic or zoomorphic "power objects" are made and handled by nganga ritual specialists. The agglomerated bilongo clinging to the wooden sculptures give the objects magical powers and they are invoked whenever a person or a community feels afflicted or threatened.

© 2021 Musée d'ethnographie, Genève