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42. Maternity Figure (Bwanga Bwa Cibola)
Luluwa, Democratic Republic of the Congo
Wood; 28.9 x 8.6 x 8.2 cm (11 3/8 x 3 3/8 x 3 1/4 in.)
Mid-late 19th century
Wirt D. Walker Endowment Fund,
© 2000 The Art Institute of Chicago

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42. Maternity Figure (Bwanga Bwa Cibola)

This work expresses a precept central to Luluwa social values—the preciousness of bringing new life into the world. The outcome of a diviner's counsel, it provided an expectant mother with spiritual protection and subsequently shielded her newborn from potential harm. One of a genre of representations commissioned by women preoccupied with such concerns, this example stands as an exceptionally accomplished artistic depiction of a woman exemplifying Luluwa ideals of beauty and well-being.1

Luluwa women who have lost children or who experience difficulty conceiving consult a diviner. The diviner determines the underlying cause of the malady, which may involve spiritual forces. The most popular diagnostic technique employed to reveal this information is that of a basket filled with small objects whose contents are cast out onto a surface, forming a configuration that is subsequently interpreted by a diviner. When diviners are unable to provide remedies for problems that they diagnose, they refer their clients to appropriate specialists. In cases concerning infertility or infant mortality, women are usually directed to healers who initiate them into a fertility cult that is prevalent throughout the region.

The cult is known to the Luluwa as bwanga bwa cibola, a name that refers to its objective of alleviating sorrow and misfortune by boosting fertility, preventing miscarriage, and safeguarding newborns. This is achieved through a strict regimen requiring that the patient follow a prescribed set of rules, most of which regulate diet and behavior. Although the Luluwa direct their prayers toward a Supreme Being, Mfidi Mukulu, it is the ancestors (bakishi) who respond to them and intercede when those prayers are accompanied by offerings. Among the delicate operations the fertility specialist performs is to reincarnate a deceased ancestor in the newborn child. To accomplish this goal, he monitors the mother's lifestyle and prescribes protective "medicine," which she wears on her person and places in her home. In the case of infertility "medicines," a wooden figure (lupingu) may serve this function. There are two varieties of these representations: small, rudimentary ones and larger, more highly refined works, such as the present example. "Medicines" are both inserted into cavities within the figure's body and contained in attachments that are tied to it. Here, holes have been drilled at the top and back of the head for that purpose, since, according to Luluwa beliefs, the fontanels (cranial depressions) are associated with divine insight into past and future experience.

It is probable that Luluwa women each owned two figural artifacts, one of which always remained at home, while the other was carried suspended from a belt or around the neck. These figures were anointed with libations and applications of red clay, palm oil, and camwood powder. Judging from its size and the two short wooden pegs at the base of its feet, the work shown here was probably created for a domestic context where it was inserted into a ritual vessel filled with "medicines." It is believed that once the goals of the initiation were successfully fulfilled, all ritual paraphernalia, including the wood figures, were destroyed.

The rarity of bwanga bwa cibola figures of this size and expressive quality suggests that the work shown here was commissioned from a highly accomplished professional sculptor and that its patron must have been a woman occupying an important position of authority. Several works of comparable stature in the collection of the Africa Museum in Tervuren, Belgium, have been attributed to the same workshop. By creating a work of exceptional beauty, beyond what one expects of a merely functional artifact, the artist has produced both a status object and an especially effective entreaty for its owner's prayers to be fulfilled.

The subject represented here is clearly conceived of as a celebration of motherhood. She holds a child in her arms, firmly angled against her body, and appears reflective as she gazes forward, her eyes slightly downcast. This expression is given emphasis by the figure's disproportionately large head and high forehead, which suggest her intelligence. Her attention appears to be somewhat distracted from the child, as if focused inward on spiritual matters, conveying an attitude that accentuates the role ascribed to women in Luluwa culture as mediators between natural and spiritual realms. This role is further underscored by her prominently protruding navel, which alludes to the cyclical nature of life and to the relationship between the ancestors and the living.

The figure projects a powerful physical presence, solidly anchored by her massive feet. The woman's strength is clearly apparent in the muscularity of her body, which is depicted as a series of discrete interconnected volumes. This formal definition reflects the artist's delight in complex surface articulation, as displayed in the typical nineteenth-century hairstyle (representing a wig made of vegetable fibers rubbed with palm oil and camwood powder) and the body's contours and richly inscribed decorative patterns. The latter are cicatrization motifs (nsalu)—concentric circles, fields of points, and sinuously curved linear flourishes—set against luminously polished skin. As adornments, they aesthetically enhance her body and endow it with the utmost cultural refinement, while at the same time, as apotropaic motifs, they provide spiritual protection. Along with her apparel of a cibola initiate (a loincloth and a belt with small gourds hanging from it), such decorative enhancements suggest that this maternity figure may depict an idealized image of its owner.

1. All information concerning contextual use of this cibola figure, Luluwa ritual practice, and iconography is drawn from the analysis of this work by Constantine Petridis in Petridis 1997.