Sculpture - Wood - Baoulé - Ivory Coast

A male Baule sculpture, Ivory Coast, standing on a circular base, short legs ending up in a prominent buttock, well-emphasized genitals, a slender torso with a pointed navel, arms carved close to the body with hands touching the abdomen, slightly emphasized pectoral muscles and shoulder blades, rounded shoulders, an elongated head, three-parted beard beneath a broad mouth, an elongated flattened nose framed by open bulging eyes with high eyebrow arches, the eyebrows extend beyond a semicircle and are connected in the middle by five small rectangular scarification marks, semicircular ears with an embedded rhomb, scarification marks all over the sculpture, capped by a domed, fine striated coiffure with a pigtail at the back; brown patina, traces of age, ritual use and several cracks, the base is partly eroded. Lit. : Susan M. Vogel: Baule. African Art, Western Eyes, 1997; Gernard de Grunne: Über den Baule-Stil und seine Meister. In: Eberhard Fischer/Lorenz Homberger: Afrikanische Meister. Kunst der Elfenbeinküste, Zürich 2014, p. 81-106.