The Metropolitan Museum of Art - Special Exhibitions: African and Oceanic Art from the Barbier-Mueller Museum, Geneva: A Legacy of Collecting

African and Oceanic Art from the Barbier-Mueller Museum, Geneva: A Legacy of Collecting


Equestrian Figure, Portrait of a Chief Indonesia, Sumatra, Toba Batak people, 19th century Stone; H: 34 1/4 in. (87 cm) Provenance: [Emile Deletaille, Brussels, 1979]; Barbier-Mueller collection, since 1979

The Toba Batak people of northern Sumatra in Indonesia are among the most accomplished sculptors in Island Southeast Asia. This powerful equestrian figure was created as a funerary monument and portrays a prominent village chief, or raja, who may also have served as a priest (datu). Members of this particular Toba Batak subgroup practiced cremation, and a stone urn containing the ashes of the raja would have been placed in front of the equestrian figure, which was accompanied by a seated female image depicting his wife. As a mark of his aristocratic status, the raja is mounted not on a horse but on a singa—a composite supernatural creature said locally to represent Raja Padoha (also called Naga Padoha), a god of the subterranean world. Singa served as protectors of the nobility. The form and features of singa vary to a considerable extent in Batak sculpture. Here it is shown as a horse-like animal with dog-like hindquarters and a long, backward-curving tongue that further emphasizes its otherworldly nature. See the Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History to learn more about the Batak.