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Course: Art of Africa > Unit 4
Lesson 2: Democratic Republic of the Congo- Crucifix (Kongo peoples)
- Female (pwo) mask (Chokwe peoples)
- Female (pwo) Mask (Chokwe peoples)
- Power Figure: Male (Nkisi)
- Power Figure, Nkisi Nkondi, Kongo peoples
- Seated Figure (Tumba) (Kongo peoples)
- Portrait of King Mishe miShyaang maMbul (Kuba peoples)
- Lukasa (memory board) (Luba peoples)
- Buli Master, possibly Ngongo ya Chintu, Prestige Stool: Female Caryatid (Luba or Hemba peoples)
- Double Prestige Panel (Kuba peoples)
- Figurative Harp (Domu) (Mangbetu peoples)
- Headdress (Yaka peoples)
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Power Figure: Male (Nkisi)
Power Figure: Male (Nkisi) (Kongo peoples), 19th-mid 20th century, Kongo peoples, wood, pigment, nails, cloth, beads, shells, arrows, leather, nuts and twine, 58.8 x 26 x 25.4 cm (The Metropolitan Museum of Art) Speakers: Dr. Peri Klemm and Dr. Beth Harris.
Want to join the conversation?
- Many of the nails on the figure's back look fairly uniform, that is, they look machine made and of fairly recent vintage. What is the last date that a nail would have been hammered into this figure's torso?(4 votes)
- How does the Warka Vase, Victory Stele of Naram-Sin, and the Stele of Hammurabi reflect the changing religious and political ideas of ancient Near East?(2 votes)
Video transcript
(light jazz music) - [Narrator] We're at the
Metropolitan Museum of Art and we're looking at a Kongo nkisi figure from the Democratic Republic of Congo. - [Narrator] So the Congo
is in Central Africa. It was a large kingdom that was founded in the 14th century,
and over the centuries, eventually colonized by Belgium. - [Narrator] When the Portuguese who arrived in Africa
in the late 15th century saw these figures, nkisi,
and also brought missionaries to Christianize the people of the Congo, they asked that these figures be burned. - [Narrator] The term
nkisi refers to a spirit, but more specifically, medicine, and when I say medicine,
I don't mean an aspirin, I mean the herbs and supplements that a healer would use to help someone on a physical, but also on a spiritual, mental, and emotional level. The nganga is the ritual specialist among the Kongo in this period of time around the 19th century who would use nkisi figures to help his clients. - [Narrator] So the nganga
would ask a sculptor to carve this, and then
the nganga would use it over the course of a
considerable amount of time, and over that time,
this figure would accrue everything that we see on it, and all of this material
is covering its abdomen where likely, although we can't see it, is a case for holding
that spiritual medicine. - [Narrator] That spiritual
center, the mooyo, the belly, is where you place the medicine or the materials, and it could be stone, it could be herbs, it
could be paste and clays. The nganga would be mixing
this formula together, placing it in the cavity in the belly, and then covering it up so
that it's completely sealed. - [Narrator] So the nganga
would use this figure in several different ways. He could use it to heal
a client who came to him, but he could also use it to record agreements and contracts, and also could activate it to go after evildoers. - [Narrator] As a witness,
the nkisi really is there to honor contracts and agreements and oaths that are taken,
and the nganga might take a strip of cloth and literally tie and bind that agreement together. - [Narrator] So each one of those knots that we're seeing is likely that. - [Narrator] And in order for the nkisi to do your bidding, that is to go after someone who broke an
oath or did you wrong, you might use dog's teeth
or elements of birds. - [Narrator] And we see a sharp object that looks like it belonged to an animal, a bird, or a dog, that could do harm. - [Narrator] In order
to activate this nkisi, 'cause really it's just a piece of wood until it's activated with a spirit, the nganga would hammer
nails into its skin, thereby calling attention to the nkisi to come and do its bidding. - [Narrator] So there are so many nails. It feels like this was used over decades. - [Narrator] It constantly looks different as the nganga works, and while
we see it here encrusted, and crumbling, and full
of lots of materials, what it's probably missing is the medicine that was in its abdomen originally because it's said that the medicine pouch is so central and so potent you would not sell this piece or let
it fall into the hands of anyone but the nganga
with that present. - [Narrator] So likely
it originally had legs, was able to stand, had a base. Those are not here. It's impossible to know
exactly what those looked like, but the figure really is
encrusted on all of its sides, but there's another
example here at the MET where we can see more clearly the opening in the abdomen. - [Narrator] And we notice
that the abdomen is hollow, so whatever was inside
of it has been taken out, rendering it impotent. - [Narrator] We also see amulets. One of them is beaded. Another looks almost like a nut that's got some carving on the outside. - [Narrator] Seed pods, pieces of animal, carved figures, and the carved figures actually have something
inside of their bellies. - [Narrator] And we seem to have two interlocking crocodiles. - [Narrator] We also
have a bell on the side which is similar to the nails in that it can be rung to bring the nkisi spirit into this figure, and
the nkisi would have been housed in the nganga's home in his shrine. - [Narrator] If I was a
client, I would bring money or something to trade to the nganga who would do this work for me, either mark a contract or
an agreement of some kind or right some sort of wrong for me. - [Narrator] And so the
nganga also has to remember what each one of these
nails and knots were for. The nkisi then becomes a wonderful historic, social document
of a group of people who sought out help from
their ritual specialist. (light jazz music)