Skip to main content
Collections Menu
SAM'S collection
Janiform figure (Saki Matwe Matwe - or Mr. Many-Heads)
Janiform figure (Saki Matwe Matwe - or Mr. Many-Heads)

Janiform figure (Saki Matwe Matwe - or Mr. Many-Heads)

Object number81.17.862
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. 271, reproduced. 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., pp. 119-20, reproduced pl. 158 (as janiform figure). 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. 27, pp. 62-63, reproduced (as Janus-faced figure (Sakimatwematwe)).
Credit LineGift of Katherine White and the Boeing Company
Dimensions11 x 4 1/8 x 3 1/4 in. (27.9 x 10.5 x 8.3 cm)
MediumWood and pigment
Janiform figure
Object number: 81.17.543
Comb with twin heads
Object number: 68.81
Melanesian
Object number: 81.17.1461
Kamangabbi figure
Melanesian
Object number: 81.17.1463
Initiation figure
Melanesian
Object number: 81.17.1499
Figure (Tadep)
Cameroonian
Object number: 81.17.712
Photo: Elizabeth Mann
Congolese
Object number: 68.136
Photo: Elizabeth Mann
Tanzanian
20th century
Object number: 2012.29.21