© Michael C. Carlos Museum, Emory University. Photo by Michael McKelvey.

ClassificationsAfrican Art

Shrine Figure, Ikenga

Place CreatedNigeria, Africa

CultureIgbo

Datelate 19th-early 20th Century

MediumWood, pigment, sacrificial material

Credit LineEx coll. William S. Arnett

Dimensions13 3/8 x 7 1/16 x 7 1/16 in. (34 x 18 x 18 cm)

Object number1994.004.617

Label TextIkenga are shrines to the right hand, but they are also symbols of ancestors and personal power. Success, strength, achievement, and assertiveness are associated with the right hand as a symbol of power. Ikenga is treated as a spirit and stays with the person who possesses it until death. If the guardian is devout, he will "feed" the ikenga daily with kola and wine. Althought this ikenga is more abstract than the other example displayed here, it has characteristic ikenga features, such as a stool for the seat of authority and horns for vitality.
Exhibition HistoryThree Rivers of Nigeria: Art of the Lower Niger, Cross, and Benue from the Collection of William and Robert Arnett, The High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia, 1978
Art of Nigeria from the William S. Arnett Collection, Michael C. Carlos Museum, October 15, 1994 - January 2, 1995
MCCM Permanent Collection Installation, Rotation 1, December 15, 1995 - February 1997
MCCM Permanent Collection Installation, July 19, 2003 - March 13, 2007
Published ReferencesMarcilene K. Wittmer and William Arnett, Three Rivers of Nigeria: Art of the Lower Niger, Cross, and Benue (Atlanta: The High Museum of Art, 1978), 9, number 9.

ProvenanceEx coll. William S. Arnett (1939-2020), Atlanta, Georgia, from at least 1978.

Status

Not on view

Collections