Cameroon
Northwest Region, Donga-Mantung Department, Nwa Commune

Wood, 65 cm

Provenance:
Louis Pieter Cornelis van Rijn
Galerie Khepri, Amsterdam (1977)
Ron Boelen, Amsterdam/Soest
Wil Hoogstraate / Galerie d'Eendt, Amsterdam
Harrie Oosthoek, The Hague
Private collection, Belgium

Powerful and very rare Kaka ancestor figure of a man carrying a child on his back.
Whereas maternity figures are ubiquitous in African sculpture, paternity figures are only known to be found among the Kaka.
Literature on the meaning of this peculiar subject is divergent, but it has been suggested that these ancestor figures symbolize the role of elders transmitting their knowledge during initiation rites to the younger members of the community. As such, the image can be read as an ancestor giving "social birth" to the young initiate.
A thick crust of soot covers the whole sculpture, albeit not obscuring the decorative patterns on the chest of the figure, or the vertical ridge on the forehead and double lines that suggest the hairdo.