Fante Female Shrine Figure

Akan Culture
Ghana
Height 39 1/4in (99.7cm)
wood, natural pigments, fiber, glass beads

Provenance
Herbert and Nancy Baker Collection, Los Angeles/Chicago
Thence by descent
James Willis Gallery, San Francisco
James Stephenson African Art, New York
Jerry Solomon Collection, Los Angeles

Publications
Cf. Robbins, Warren and Nancy Nooter, African Art in American Collections, Schi er
Publishing Ltd., 2004, fig. 526; and
Seiber, Roy and Frank Herreman, Hair in African Art and Culture – Status, Symbols and
Style, Prestel, 2000, p. 192 for a similar figure formerly in the Leon and Fern Wallace
Collection and probably by the same hand.

Robbins and Nooter note (ibid., p. 206), “Large figural sculpture, stylistically related to
that of the Anyi, is rare.”

“Like akuaba, larger figural sculptures have many functions. A considerable variety of
forms exist, yet only in a few instances can we be sure of the original contexts and
precise meanings, as there is rarely a form-function relationship. [. . .]

The standing female icon common in West African sculpture has various
interpretations. In these Akan examples, poise, dignity, and stability are the keynotes.
Inheritance and succession follow the female line; women must be strong, solidly
rooted to earth but upright on it.” (Cole, Herbert & Doran Ross, The Arts of Ghana,
UCLA Museum of Cultural History, 1977, pp. 107-113)

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