Female Figure (late 1800s-early 1900s): Art, History and Details

Female Figure (late 1800s-early 1900s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Mankishi figures were believed to have magical powers and were used by diviners to contact spirits in otherworldly realms. Smaller, personal power figures were used to connect with “common” ancestors, while the larger Mankishi figures contacted higher-ranking ancestral spirits. These power figures were kept in their own personal spaces because of their powerful status, and could only be handled by their designated nkunja, or guardian.

Object facts

• Title: Female Figure
• Date: late 1800s-early 1900s
• Culture: Africa, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Songye people
• Type: Sculpture
• Technique: Wood, upholstery studs, antelope horns, and animal hair
• Dimensions: Overall: 34.8 x 6.2 x 14.5 cm (13 11/16 x 2 7/16 x 5 11/16 in.)
• Collection: African Art
• Department: African Art
• Accession number: 2010.452

A detail from the museum

Because this Mankishi is neither small or quite large in size, it was most likely used by a family rather than an individual.

Collection credit

René and Odette Delenne Collection, Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Petridis, Constantine. "René and Odette Delenne." In Tribal Art XV-4, no. 61 (Autumn 2011): 123.
• Petridis, Constantine, et al. Fragments of the Invisible: The René and Odette Delenne Collection of Congo Sculpture. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art. Milan: 5 Continents Editions, 2013, 23, 68-75.
• Neyt, Francois. Songye: The Formidable Statuary of Central Africa. Munich/Berlin/London/New York: Prestel Verlag, 2009, 262.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.