Igbo Ibo Mother Child Figure Antique African Sculpture Sublime Expression, Extensive AGE, Tribal USE, Superb ! Start Price USD 2,985.00 Current Price USD 2,985.00 Time Left - Bid Count 0 Buy It Now Price - Reserve Price - Start Time Thursday, November 27, 2008 End Time Saturday, December 27, 2008 Location Santa Fe, NM See more about 'Igbo Ibo Mother Child Figure Antique African Sculpture' Description   An Exquisite OLD Igbo Ibo Mother and Child FigureAntique African Art - Ugonachomma Display SculptureNiger River Delta - Nigeria     An Exquisite Old Igbo Ibo Ugonachomma Display Figure StatueAntique African Art - Tribal Sculpture - Niger River Delta Nigeria, West Africa Collected from the: Igbo Ibo peoples of the northwestern Niger River Delta region of Nigeria, West AfricaMaterial: Carved wood, pigment, chalkPeriod: Very early 20th centuryDimensions: 29.25" height, 9.5" width, 9" depth; weight is 5.10 poundsCondition: Exquisite, no damage or repair. This spectacular museum quality sculpture hails from a prestigious private Houston collection, near pristine condition as would be anticipated for a display and/or dance prop - see the notes below. Superior signs of age, wear and authentic tribal use, exposed wood presents exceptional patination. Make special note of the surface condition, tool signatures and original sacred white chalk undercoat, all indicative of an authentic early specimen - patinated early pigments create a sublime surface condition that really brings this old character to life ! 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 Igbo Ibo Ugonachomma Figure Display SculpturesSome of the same sculptors who carved conventional cult images in the northwestern Igbo areas also created secular "dance emblems" for display and prestige purposes. In doing so they broke away from the somewhat rigid forms and poses of ritual figures, creating quite life-like, flesh-and-blood images with closely observed detail. Secular sculptures were of a different order than the typically simplified cult statuary whose standardized posturing, schematic facial features and absence of detail lacked the palpable fleshiness of most display carvings. Secular sculptures prove beyond question that African artists were fully capable of highly realistic, lifelike renderings. Ibo artists freed themselves in the display sculptures, distorting the human body within a naturalistic mode to emphasize popular concepts of feminine beauty: long necks, fine hairstyles, a well-fed, even slightly corpulent look, precise attention to jewelry and other enhancing features such as scarification and body painting. These works of art - for they were consciously made as such - were generically called "The Eagle seeks out beauty," or Ugonachomma, a metaphorical expression which compared a young woman with an eagle. Both were moral and aesthetic ideals in Igbo thought. Beautiful women or idealized couples were appropriate symbols for age-grades who commissioned them for competitive and festive dance displays. Display sculptures served as stationary centerpieces - stage props - and identifying emblems for those who owned them. Paraded through public dance arenas, their most common appearance was the dry season festival which also featured maiden spirit masquerades. Display emblems called attention to the same feminine virtues and beauties as the masked characters, though without their exaggerations. Such three-level interplay - among real women, display sculptures, and masked dancers - dramatized the feminine side of Ibo life. See Igbo Arts for a fascinating account of this form. Igbo Ibo Tribal History:The 8,000,000 Igbo people settled in an area of forests and swamps in the northern part of the Niger River Delta in southern Nigeria and live primarily from farming. Village councils composed of the eldest people from each family govern the tribe though their power is counter-balanced by secret societies. Igbo arts are notable for their quality, diversity and quantity, comprising a vast corpus of sophisticated figural sculptures and masks, implements, paintings, and architecture in terracotta, ivoire, iron, various fibers, unfired clay, bronze, brass and wood all created to serve a critical role in upholding Igbo values - from the emotional and psychological well-being of an individual to the larger world view and continuity of an entire community. These arts functioned simultaneously to improve and reflect the quality of life, to honor gods, and to entertain. The earliest Igbo art forms - spectacular copper-alloy castings from Igbo-Ukwu - date back to the tenth century and are considered the earliest known fine metal objects from tropical Africa. Virtually no aspect of Igbo life is untouched by aesthetic concerns. 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