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Seated Female Figure

19th - early 20th century (before 1913)
Not on view
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.
The University of Pennsylvania Museum was the first American institution to purchase African art for its aesthetic qualities and not solely as ethnographic records. In 1919, its influential director, George B. Gordon, acquired through the De Zayas Gallery a group of eleven works from Charles Vignier, including this Ijo female figure. It originated in the former trading port of Brass in the Niger Delta, where an ubiquitous genre of sculpture emerged toward the end of the nineteenth century as a consequence of decades of European encounters. Figures such as this one on view in the exhibition, characterized by heightened naturalism, diminutive legs, and articulated arms, were portraits of deceased members of the king’s family. When the family converted to Christianity, they gave a group of these large carvings to missionaries who brought them to Europe shortly afterwards.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Seated Female Figure
  • Date: 19th - early 20th century (before 1913)
  • Geography: Nigeria
  • Culture: Ijo peoples
  • Medium: Wood
  • Dimensions: H.: 33 1/2 in. (85.09 cm)
  • Classification: Wood-Sculpture
  • Credit Line: The University of Pennsylvania Museum, Philadelphia
  • Curatorial Department: The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing