Tribal Art

This sculpture of African art Dogon, with a surreal aspect, carved in wood, is made up of an assembly of heads, separating into branches. One of the elements is a long neck bearing an ancestor's face. Golden beige grainy patina. Desication cracks.

These statues, sometimes embodying the nyama of the deceased, are placed on ancestor altars and take part in various rituals, including those during sowing and harvesting periods. Alongside Islam, Dogon religious rites are organized around four main cults: the Lébé, relating to fertility, under the spiritual authority of the Hogon, the Wagem, ancestor worship under the authority of the patriarch, the Binou invoking the spirit world and led by the priest of the Binou, and the society of masks concerning the funeral.
According to the Dogon cosmogony, the first primordial ancestors of Dogon , called Nommo, were the bisexual water gods. They were created in heaven by the creator god Amma and descended from heaven to earth in an ark.
The Nommo founded the eight lineages of Dogon and instilled weaving, the art of blacksmithing, and agriculture to their human descendants.
Ref. : "Dogon" H. Leloup, ed. Quai Branly Museum.