Heddle Pulley with Figure

Baule peoples and their neighbors to the West, the Guro, are famous as weavers, and are known for their fine indigo-and-white cotton fabrics. Used on the traditional narrow-band loom, heddle pulleys are functional objects used to ease the movements of the heddles while separating the warp threads and allowing the shuttle to seamlessly pass through the layers of thread. Like many other carved objects used in everyday activities among the Baule, these pulleys were often embellished for the weaver’s delight. Scholars have suggested that the prominent display of pulleys, hanging over the weaver’s loom in the public place, afforded artists their best opportunity to showcase their carving skills, in the hope to attract commissions for figures and masks. In this figurative example, the carved head at the top is turned sideways, meaning that while working at the loom the weaver would have seen the carefully defined head in profile. The surface of the body and neck of the pulley presents distinctive incised details such as chevron patterns and the shoulders show motifs of mask-like buffalo heads. This pulley demonstrates the efforts put by Baule artists into beautifying the simplest functional object.