FEATURE
108
FIGS. 13a and b (left):
Mother-and-child figure,
bwanga bwa Cibola.
Probably Bakwa Mushilu
subgroup, Luluwa, Democratic
Republic of the Congo.
Wood, pigment. H: 28.9 cm.
Ex Jaap Wiegersma, Netherlands;
A. F. C. A. van Heyst, Netherlands, by
1937; J. van Heyst, Canada; Sotheby’s,
New York, 14 November 1980; Thomas
Alexander, St. Louis, USA; Stuart
Hollander, USA; Thomas Alexander, St.
Louis, USA.
The Art Institute of Chicago, Wirt D.
Walker Endowment Fund, 1993,
inv. 1993.354.
Photos © The Art Institute of Chicago/Art
Resource, New York.
A classic example of one of the most
readily identifiable Luluwa styles, named
after the Bakwa Mushilu subgroup
from the vicinity of Demba in northern
Luluwaland, this maternity figure is
remarkable because of the preserved peglike
extension under its feet with which
it would have been stuck into a clay pot
or a basket filled with earth and other
ingredients.
FIG. 14 (right):
Female figure, bwanga bwa
Cibola.
Probably Bakwa Ndoolo
subgroup, Luluwa, Democratic
Republic of the Congo.
Wood (Hymenocardia acida), pigment,
cord, beads. H: 48 cm.
Field collected by Tiarko Fourche,
1933–36.
RMCA, Tervuren, 1946,
inv. EO.0.0.43858.
Photo: Roger Asselberghs, © Royal
Museum for Central Africa, Tervuren.
This sculpture is part of a group of works
in the same substyle associated with the
Bakwa Ndoolo subgroup in southern
Luluwaland. All were acquired in the
early 1930s by the same colonial official
and were likely all carved in the same
workshop, if not by the same master.
FIG. 15 (center right):
Female figure, bwanga bwa
Cibola, carved by Mulumba
Tshiswaka of the village of
Mbumba.
Bakwa Ndoolo subgroup,
Luluwa, Democratic Republic of
the Congo.
Wood, pigment. H: 36 cm.
Field acquired by Paul Timmermans,
Belgium, probably 1955–62.
Ex J. J. Klejman, New York, USA; Jay T.
Last, USA.
Felix Collection, Belgium.
Photo courtesy of the Congo Basin Art
History Research Center, Brussels, © Dick
Beaulieux.
Mothers holding their children and
pregnant women are two sculpture types
that are associated with a widespread
power object called Cibola and its related
cult and rituals that address concerns of
human fertility, pregnancy, and childbirth.