Voodoo Voodoo - ASEN Altar - FON - Togo

ASEN FON Altar (Togo, Benin)

diameter 27 cms height 80 cms

In oxidized black iron.

The asen is consecrated and installed in the ancestral hut during the ceremonies which
mark the lifting of mourning. The deceased resides in this altar where he is offered "to drink": alcohol
and libations.

Dahomean art has a very great originality, that of having transmitted in the form
of ideograms and rebuses the history and traditions of the Fon people.
The figures on the asen are supposed to refer to the person we want
commemorate. They are generally a direct representation of the profession of the deceased or
of his religious affiliation. The asen is decorated with symbols specific to each deceased.
This is why the Fon themselves say that the only people capable of
fully understand these symbols are the one who made the asen or the one who
sponsored.