Bamana Bambara Mother Child Antique African Figure Mali Exquisite 14" Jo Statue Encrusted Oiled Patina SUPERB ! Start Price USD 1,885.00 Current Price USD 1,885.00 Time Left - Bid Count 0 Buy It Now Price - Reserve Price - Start Time Friday, July 18, 2008 End Time Friday, July 25, 2008 Location Santa Fe, NM See more about 'Bamana Bambara Mother Child Antique African Figure Mali' Description   An Exquisite Bamana Bambara Mother and Child Figure JO StatueAntique African Art - Tribal Sculpture - Mali     An Important Old Bamana Bambara Jomojoniw Mother and Child Figure JO StatueAntique African Art - Tribal Sculpture - Mali Collected from the: Bamana Bambara peoples of the Bougouni region of Mali, West AfricaMaterial: Hardwood, cotton cloth, encrustation, Shea and skin oil, custom wood standPeriod: Very early 20th centuryDimensions: 15.25" total height: 14" height, 3.5" width, 3.5" depth on 5.25" x 4.5" baseWeight: 1.65 pound figure or 2.60 pounds w/ standCondition: Exquisite! This important, museum quality specimen hails from a prestigious Houston collection. Superb signs of age and authentic wear from extensive tribal use, minor age cracks and early indigenous repair under cotton cloth wrapping at right arm all test stable, wear-exposed wood displays significant patination. Fine encrustation indicative of sacrificial libations along with accumulated minute debris of a long life. Burnished ever-so-slightly oily surface condition at hat, ears, braids, nose, faces, shoulders, outer arms, lower legs and baby's back - exactly where human hands would have held the piece - suggest frequent handling along with benefiting from repeated annual ritual cleansing. Clearly an esteemed early Jo figure, make special note of the serene facial expressions and superior surface condition - an absolutely stunning example of Bamana art ! Please click on the photos below to fully appreciate this important old figure! And be sure to see the exquisite AFRICAN SCULPTURES in our eBay store! Or explore our extraordinary Private Collection of AFRICAN ARTIFACTS Click Images to Enlarge Jo Jomojoniw and and Gwan Gwandenw SculpturesThe annual appearance of the sculptures at Jo and Gwan rituals was considered a marvelous and extraordinary site to behold. Emanating from the Jara bugu, the focus of the Jo?s sacred objects and, by their ritual washing and oiling, the sculptures served as tangible proof of the annual renewal and purification of Jo, but just as striking were their visual forms and the variety and nature of the persons they represent. The Jo and Gwan figures were typically larger and more massive than other Bamana figures with thick, cylindrical torsos, broad shoulders and ovoid heads. Their arms and legs connect to shoulders and hips in a fluid manner, unlike the abrupt angular transitions noted in other types of Bamana sculpture, including the Nyeleni sculptures used by new Jo initiates. The Jo and Gwan sculptures represent both females and males, whereas other types of Bamana sculpture were almost exclusively female. A seated mother and child and a seated or standing male figure formed the central couple in both Jo and Gwan ensembles. Some of the figures, both male and female, were depicted wearing objects associated with occult powers, such as amulet-studded hats, animal horns filled with spiritually-charged substances, and protective charms. The ubiquity and centrality of the mother and child sculptures express the importance of fertility and childbearing not just to Bamana women but to the entire community. Usually seated in honor on a stool and laden with power-charged amulets on her hat, the figures of mothers and babies also seem to embody the idea of extraordinary forces. These were the forces that Jo and Gwan utilized to augment and assure fertility as well as those that women could possess and pass on to their children. Gwan?s express purpose was to address problems of infertility while Jo?s aim was the harmonious continuation of society. The Jomojoniw and Gwandenw, with the mother and child figures at their center, were perfect visual manifestations of these goals. Bamana Bambara JO Initiation Society TraditionsThe Bamana used the term Jo to connote ?the secret sworn to upon an altar?, by extension an initiating society, a cult; the secret; to be right, from where ?truth?, that which is rigorously exact; wash, cleanse and by extension purify.? More than these concepts, Jo practices were organized around a certain number of fundamental ideas which the initiation candidate put into practice or submitted to during the rites. The Jo society was located primarily in southern Mali, though it extended eastward during the 1950?s and 1960?s even into and among villages of Senufo peoples who did not practice Poro. Membership was mandatory for all the young men of families who practice Jo which differed from other Bamana associations in that young women were also initiated, although their rituals were shorter and less demanding. Several styles and forms of Jomojoniw sculptures, masks, heads and costumes constituted the visual ornaments of the Jo society, and of Gwan, one of Jo?s ritual components. The Bambara call these visual elements mafile fenw, fleli fenw or laje fenw, meaning ?things to look at?. They were used to attract and focus the attention of the audience and participants at performances and rituals to condense and convey the meaning of the event. Jo initiation took place every seven years, during which time three groups of boys were circumcised, one group every other year, to create a pool of candidates to be initiated in the seventh year. This lengthy preliminary period was considered the time for ?opening the eyes? through exposure to Jomojoniw and Jonyeleniw objects, places and people that had significance for the Jo. The actual initiation was then performed in April or May of the seventh year, at the very beginning of the rainy season. Initiation proceedings began on a Saturday night when the candidates demonstrated the Jo dances and songs they had learned. The following afternoon the candidates entered the ?elephant house,? a temporary construction with a carved wooden elephant head above its entrance, where they were ritually ?killed?. Jo killing occurred on Sunday night, in the elephant house, where the candidates were symbolically killed with a lance touch under the arm and then ?revived?. After a several day retreat to the forest, the initiates would return to the village as ?children of Jo? to dress in carefully constructed costumes of fibers adorned with red and white seeds that they had prepared during their period of training. Called foo yira, ?to show the fibers? enabled the initiated to present their new status as Jodenw members. In addition to the initiation, the Jo society also practiced an annual cycle of rituals, the most important of which were Jo ko don or ?the day of the Jo affair? and jara son, ?the offering of the sweetness of life? to renew the annual cycle of seasons, encourage the fertility of both women and crops, renew oaths to honor the ancestors, and to strengthen the Jo society?s Jomojoniw ritual objects by refreshing them with sacrifices. Jara son culminated in a public ritual in which the leaders of Jo removed the statues from the house in which the ritual objects were stored and carried them in a dancing procession to the lineage?s main vestibule, the seat of its ancestors. The Jotigi (Jo chief) and two high Jo officials purified the statues by pouring ladles of water over them, after which post-menopausal women thoroughly washed the statues with warm water and soap, anointed them with shea oil, and then decorated them with beads thus cleansing and renewing the statues, and the Jo itself, for another year. Information on Bamana Bambara Tribal History"The 2,500,000 Bamana people, also called Bambara, form the largest ethnic group within Mali and occupy the central part of the country, in an area of the savannah. They live principally from agriculture, with some subsidiary cattle rearing in the northern part of their territory. The Bambara people are predominantly animists, although recently the Muslim faith has been spreading among them. The Bambara kingdom was founded in the 17th century and reached its pinnacle between 1760 and 1787 during the reign of N'golo Diarra. N'golo Diarra is credited with conquering the Peul people and in turn claimed the cities of Djenne and Timbuktu. However, during the 19th century, the kingdom began to decline and ultimately fell to the French when they arrived in 1892. For the most part, Bambara society is structured around six male societies, known as the Dyow. The stylistic variations in Bambara art are extreme - sculptures, masks, and headdresses display either stylized or realistic features, and either weathered or encrusted patinas. Until quite recently, the function of Bambara pieces was shrouded in mystery, but in the last twenty years field studies have revealed that certain types of figures and headdresses were associated with a number of the societies that structure Bamana life," according to Bacquart. "Among the Bamana and Maninka, initiation societies, called jow, were and sometimes still are of profound social and political significance. Some of them like the Ntomo, Kore, or their local equivalents, impose rites of passage: in the villages where they exist, every boy has to accomplish their rituals in order to accede to adulthood. Other socities such as the Komo, the Nama and the Ci-wara are "power associations" in which men participate in order to gain power and protect their dependents." For many of those interested in the African art, the Bamana have come to be seen as a classic example of "traditional" Sudanic civilization, a conservative inward-looking society of farmers and artists largely unaffected by the forces which shape Malian history. A most remarkable society of people living in the middle Niger Valley that somehow resisted the full thrust of Islamic religious renewal, the holy wars of the nineteenth century, and subsequent French imperialism and colonization - they appear almost heroic in surviving those raging events while remaining faithful to an artistic tradition based upon ancient precepts and values. We highly recommended reading Bamana: The Art of Existence in Mali (Colleyn) and Bamana Figurative Sculpture (Ezra) for an exceptionally well detailed account of this fascinating culture. 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