Sobre el lote Lote N° 141
Título : SONGYE COMMUNITY POWER FIGURE, NAMED "LUPIKA", BY THE SCULPTOR YAKYOMBA, DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGO
Procedencia : Photographed in situ by Alan P. Merriam (1923-1980) in the village Lupupa Ngye in 1959-60Morton Dimondstein, Los Angeles, acquired in ca. 1972Joshua Dimondstein, Los Angeles, by descent from the aboveAcquired by the present owner from the above in 2001
Literature : Alan P. Merriam, "Change in Religion and the Arts in a Zairian Village," African Arts, VII, no. 4, Summer 1974, p. 48Alan P. Merriam, An African World: The Basongye village of Lupupa Ngye, Bloomington and London, 1974, pp. 124-125 (discussed in text without illustration)Dimondstein Tribal Arts (advertisement), Tribal Arts - Le Monde de L'Art Tribal, vol. VI, no. 1, Winter/Spring 1999/2000, p. 33Paul Rossi, African Mirror, Plattsburgh, 2003, inside coverViviane Baeke, Anne-Marie Bouttiaux and Hughes Dubois (eds.), Le Sensible et la Force, Tervuren, 2004, p. 27, fig. 4Laurie McLaughlin, "Lost and Found", Space Orange County, April 2007, p. 50
Notas : The offered Songye figure is one of the very few works of African art to have survived together with their contextual information. "Lupika" was first documented by the anthropologist and musicologist Alan P. Merriam (1923-1980), Professor and former Chairman of the Department of Anthropology at Indiana University, who visited Lupupa Ngye, a village to the north-east of Tshofa in Songye territory, in 1959-1960 and again in 1973. "Lupika's" history is detailed in Merriam's monograph An African World: The Basongye village of Lupupa Ngye (Merriam 1974a); a brief discussion of "Lupika" is also contained in Merriam's essay "Change in Religion and the Arts in a Zairian Village" (Merriam 1974b). Referring to his first visit to Lupupa Ngye, Merriam (1974b: 48) reports: "In 1959-60, and apparently stretching back into the past, what little regular group ceremonial was practiced in the village centered upon a large carved wooden figure named Lupika. Lupika was an nkishi, or village fertility figure, associated with the first appearance of the new moon, and his presence assured the general well-being of the village, the fertility of its women and land, and protection against catastrophe, malignant forces in general, and particularly, witches."
And at another place Merriam (1974a: 124-125) explains further: "the people [of Lupupa Ngye] commissioned the carver Yakyomba of the village Mona to make the figure named Lupika which was still in use in 1960. [...] Lupika's public appearances [were] jealously guarded from the outsider and it was only on a very few occasions that I was permitted to be present. The heavy figure is carried by means of two poles lashed to his base; those who carry and at the same time dance with him may be anyone who wishes to do so. Special songs are sung on the occasion, accompanied by slit wooden gong, drum, double iron gong, and rattle, and general dancing occurs. Lupika is accompanied by special attendants, bilumbu (s. kilumbu), who are chosen by dream. [...] Lupika is 'fed,' primarily with chicken livers, and chicken blood is dripped over his head by him who provides housing to the figure; the occasions for such offerings are signaled in dreams."Merriam (1974b: 48) discusses also the circumstances of "Lupikas" departure from the village Lupupa Ngye: "It is symbolic, as well as simultaneously resultant of a long prior struggle, that Lupika was sold to a Zairian trader at least two or three years ago [written in 1974, this means 1971 or 1972], and quite possibly before that. The ever-present split between young and old was clearly involved in the sale of the figure, for while the old believed in Lupika and in the traditional system he represented, the young had begun to lose their belief at least as early as 1959-60; today [i.e. during Merriam's visit in 1973, following their conversion to Christianity] they say that Lupika was the Devil [...]."Two closely related figures, with round shoulders, full lips, and an identical treatment of the hands, are today in the collection of the Musée Royal de l'Afrique Centrale, Tervuren. Both were collected by Belgian Colonial Administrators around 1940 (accession nos. "RG 43948" and "RG 39581", published in Baeke 2004: 28-29 and 64-65, cats. 8 and 9) and presumably created in the 1920s-1930s. One of them (accession no. "RG 39581") is known to have been found in the proximity of Tshofa. Given their close stylistic similarities as well as the date and in one case also the location of their collecting in situ, it seems plausible to assume that both figures are also works by Yakyomba, the same artist who created "Lupika".
Sotheby's, subastador, New York, US
🔓Sin tarjeta de crédito.
Título de venta : African, Oceanic and Pre-Columbian Art
Fecha de la venta : 14/05/2010
🔓Sin tarjeta de crédito.
Referencia de la subasta : Live Sale
