African Arts Gallery

Female figure in a seated position, presenting the cup mboko, a gourd that was filled with kaolin, symbolizing purity and the spiritual world, and which the king's visitors would smear on out of respect. On the bust are inscribed in checkerboard pattern the scarifications in use. According to P. Nooter these figures represented the diviner's wife, which underlines her importance in the divination process bilumbu. Matt patina, velvety, pink ochre. Abrasions.
The Luba (Baluba in Tchiluba) are a people of Central Africa. Their cradle is Katanga, more precisely the region of the Lubu river, so the name (Baluba, which means "the Lubas"). They were born from a secession of the Songhoy ethnic group, under the leadership of Ilunga Kalala, who had the old king Kongolo, venerated since then in the form of a python, die. In the 16th century they created a state, organized as a decentralized chieftaincy, which extended from the Kasai River to Lake Tanganyika. The chiefdoms cover a small territory without real border that includes at most three villages.