Object Details
Maker
Anang artist
Ibibio artist
Label Text
Depictions of Mami Wata testify to the dynamism and creativity with which Africans respond to imported ideas and images. Mami Wata is recognized today by peoples throughout Africa as a powerful water spirit. Her origins can be traced to a late 19th century lithograph of a female snake charmer in Hamburg, Germany. In the 1950s this image was reprinted in a calendar from an Indian company that was circulated widely in western and central Africa.
In southeast Nigeria among the Anang Ibibio, figures and masks of Mami Wata blended with ideas of earlier water spirits and deities. She was considered a giver of wealth and was also linked with curing problems of infertility. Her brightly painted images often include long fiber tresses.
Description
Wood torso of a female with upraised arm holding one snake in her proper right hand, draped over her shoulders with the tail paralleling her proper left arm. A second snake circles her waist with its head under the woman's chin. The hair is made of raffia and the face and arms are painted pink with a blue blouse and a white belt. The snakes are black with small white spots and larger yellow spots.
Provenance
Unknown sculptor, Nigeria; sold to Flora Edouwaye S. Kaplan (1930-2021), New York, at the main market in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, 1983; donated to the National Museum of African Art, Washington, D.C., 2008.
Exhibition History
Currents: Water in African Art, National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., June 2016-ongoing
Conversations: African and African American Artworks in Dialogue - From the Collections of the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art and Camille O. and William H. Cosby, Jr., National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, November 7, 2014-January 24, 2016
Mami Wata: Arts for Water Spirits in Africa and the African Atlantic World, Fowler Museum, University of California, Los Angeles, April 6-August 10, 2008; Chazen Museum of Art, University of Wisconsin, Madison, October 18, 2008-January 11, 2009; National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., April 1-July 26, 2009; Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts, Stanford University, September 29, 2010-January 2, 2011
Published References
Kreamer, Christine Mullen and Adrienne L. Childs (eds). 2014. Conversations: African and African American Artworks in Dialogue from the Collections of the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art and Camille O. and William H. Cosby, Jr. Washington, D.C.: National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, p. 115, pl. 45.
Salmons, Jill. 2008. "Mammy Wata among the Annang Ibibio." Mami Wata: Arts for Water Spirits in Africa and Its Diasporas, ed. by Henry J. Drewal. Los Angeles: Fowler Museum of Cultural History, University of California, p. 125, no. 6.10.
Content Statement
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Credit Line
Gift of Flora Edouwaye S. Kaplan
Date
Late 20th century
Object number
2009-16-1
Restrictions & Rights
Usage conditions apply
Type
Figure
Medium
Wood, paint, raffia
Dimensions
H x W x D: 67.5 x 53 x 28 cm (26 9/16 x 20 7/8 x 11in.)
Geography
Nigeria
See more items in
National Museum of African Art Collection
Exhibition
Currents: Water in African Art
On View
NMAfA, Third Level Corridor
Data Source
National Museum of African Art
Topic
snake
Mami Wata
male
female
Link to Original Record
Record ID
nmafa_2009-16-1