Lotto 93 | An imposing African Yagalagana figure

Guidoriccio Casa d'Aste - Via ferraris 128, 52100 AREZZO

An imposing African Yagalagana figure

An imposing African Yagalagana figure
Nigeria, Benue river valley region - Mumuye people
Light wood with black lustrous patina.
This extremely stylized human standing figure of exceptionally large size constitutes one of the most iconic examples of artistic abstraction in African Art. Yagalagana sculptures always represent standing human figure whose somatic features are always very stylized. According to some scholars, the definition of the gender in these sculptures is entrusted to the shape of auricles: if large and pierced the figure depicts a female on the contrary males are identifiable by small often funnel-shaped ears. Use for divination the Yagalagana figures, carved by blacksmiths or weavers, are kept in separate huts protected and watched by the village healer.
H cm 112