Female figure container · Tanzania, Luguru / Sagara · ID: 3053657
Marc Leo Felix, Brussels, Belgium
Fred Jahn, Munich, Germany
Walter Bareiss, Greenwich, USA & Salach, Germany
Neumeister, Munich, Germany, 13 November 2008, lot 1265
Alain Bovis, Paris, France
Private Collection
Lempertz, Brussels, Belgium, 27 January 2015, lot 254
Arno Henseler, Munich, Germany
Description
wood, cloth, miniature beads, a separately carved head serving as a stopper, handwritten collection number “FE9326”, base
This figure, which has been published and exhibited on several occasions, takes the form of an anthropomorphic container. According to Felix (pp. 415 f.), figures of this kind could hold symbolic or sacred substances and were used in various ritual contexts.
Female wooden figures could represent prominent deceased women, mythical clan foundresses or ancestral mothers.
Publications
Felix, Marc L., Mwana Hiti, München 1990, p. 119, ill. X/21; Jahn, Jens (ed.), Tanzania, München 1994, p. 151, ill. 68; Roy, Christopher D., Kilengi, Afrikanische Kunst aus der Sammlung Bareiss, München 1997, p. 65, ill. 6; van Wyk, Gary, Shangaa, Art of Tanzania, New York 2013, p. 24, ill. 0.1
AHDRC: 0119064
Exhibition
Kilengi, African Art from the Bareiss Family Collection, Hannover, Germany, Kestner Gesellschaft, 30 August - 19 October 1997; Vienna, Austria, MAK - Österreichisches Museum für angewandte Kunst, 12 November 1997 - 18 January 1998; Munich, Germany, Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, 8 April 1998 - 5 July 1998; Iowa City, USA, The University of Iowa Museum of Art, 27 March 1999 - 23 May 1999; Purchase, New York, Neuberger Museum of Art, State University of New York, 26 September 1999 - 10 January 2000