African Arts Gallery

Made in the Cameroonian Grasslands using the traditional decorative technique using multicolored glass beads, this head reproduces the famous effigies of sovereigns. Carefully applied to a terracotta surface, the pearls accentuate the features and the headdress with strongly contrasting colors.
In African art, the artistic movement of which these sculptures are a part bears the name of the ancient religious capital of Nigeria, Ifè, one of the many city-states established by the Yoruba. This civilization succeeded the Nok civilization. This city-state of Ilé-Ifé, whose rise culminated from the 12th to the 15th century, had an artistic tradition of royal portraits imbued with realism, funeral effigies in bronze but also in terracotta.