Bâton de danse "oshe shango" · Nigéria, Yoruba, Igbomina, "Maître du tombeau d´Owu Shango" · ID: 3049093
Ursula Heijs-Voorhuis, Sint Agatha, The Netherlands
Description
wood, pigments, base
Working with William Fagg and other scholars of Yoruba art, Deborah & Jeffrey Stokes Hammer were able to identify the style of an artist who they believe can be counted among the finest carving masters in African art.
After an unusually conceived “shango” staff of excellent quality documented in a 1964 photograph by John Picton taken at a shrine in the small Igbomina village of Owu, they named the carver “Master of the Owu Shango Shrine” (cf. AHDRC 0105025).
William Fagg has speculated that this artist lived sometime in the 1850s to circa 1925 in the Igbomina Yoruba region.
The present staff shows great similarities with the staff from Owu, both formally and stylistically, especially in the physiognomy of the figures with their strongly bulging eyes. The double axe shows an unusual crescent shape and is carved with faces at both ends. It is crowned by a kneeling pair of figures.
In the meantime many other works by this hand, mainly “ibeji” figures, have appeared (cf. African Arts,1986, XIX-2, p. 71).
Littérature comparée
African Arts, Vol.XIX, Nr.2, February 1986, p.70-73
Publications
AHDRC: 0104697