Female Farming Animal headdress (Ci Wara)

A fusion of two animals-an antelope and aardvark-is achieved in this tribute to a mythical culture hero. Alert and agile, both the mother and her baby seem ready to leap with energy as they hold erect their strong spiraling horns and ears. Their bodies and snouts are modeled after an aardvark, whose ability to dig rapidly into the ground and create subterranean tunnels is admired by Bamana farmers.

A female chorus of togo-fu (praise singers) dance behind Tyi Wara masqueraders to encourage their performance. One song from such a performance tells of the Bamana myth of primordial times: A water spirit, Faro, in the shape of the Tyi Wara, appears before the future king of the Segou kingdom and leads him to a watery domain and there shows him a piece of gold, a piece of silver, and a pile of grain saying, "Choose: gold and silver, they are wealth; seeds, they are power."

Wood, brass, and wool

34 1/2 x 3 15/16 x 10 1/16 in. (87.6 x 10 x 25.6 cm)

Gift of Katherine White and the Boeing Company

81.17.23

Provenance: [Merton D. Simpson Gallery, New York]; purchased from gallery by Katherine White (1929-1980), Seattle, Washington, 1967; bequeathed to Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, Washington, 1981

Photo: Paul Macapia

Now on view at the Seattle Art Museum

Resources

Exhibition HistoryCleveland, Ohio, Cleveland Museum of Art, African Tribal Images: The Katherine White Reswick Collection, July 10 - Sept. 1, 1968 (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, University of Pennsylvania Museum, Oct. 10 - Dec. 1, 1968). Text by William Fagg. Cat. no. 10 (as Antelope Headdress).

Los Angeles, California, Frederick S. Wight Art Gallery, University of California, African Art in Motion: Icon and Act, Jan. 20 - Mar. 17, 1974 (Washington, D.C., National Gallery of Art, May 5 - Sept. 22, 1974). Text by Robert Farris Thompson. No cat. no., p. 92, reproduced pl. 123 (as "chi wara").

Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Praise Poems: The Katherine White Collection, July 29 - Sept. 29, 1984 (Washington, D.C., National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Oct. 31, 1984 - Feb. 25, 1985; Raleigh, North Carolina Museum of Art, Apr. 6 - May 19, 1985; Fort Worth, Texas, Kimbell Art Museum, Sept. 7 - Nov. 25, 1985; Kansas City, Missouri, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Mar. 8 - Apr. 20, 1986). Text by Pamela McClusky. Cat. no. 31, pp. 70-71, reproduced (as Female antelope headdress (Tjiwara muso)).

New York, New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Genesis: Origins in African Sculpture, Oct. 20, 2002 - July 4, 2003.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia Museum of Art, African Art, African Voices: Long Steps Never Broke a Back, organized by the Seattle Art Museum, Oct. 2, 2004 - Jan. 2, 2005 (Hartford, Connecticut, Wadsworth Atheneum, Feb. 12 - June 19, 2005; Cincinnati, Ohio, Cincinnati Art Museum, Oct. 8, 2005 - Jan. 1, 2006; Nashville, Tennessee, Frist Center for the Visual Arts, Jan. 27 - Apr. 30, 2006). Text by Pamela McClusky. No cat. no., pp. 52-53, reproduced pl. 30 (as Farming-animal crest mask (tyi wara)).

Published ReferencesMcClusky, Pamela. African Art: From Crocodiles to Convertibles in the Collection of the Seattle Art Museum, Seattle: Seattle Art Museum, 1987; p. 3, reproduced (as Female antelope headdress).

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