Fang, Mvai, and others
Seated Male Figure from a Reliquary Ensemble (Bieri)
Fang, Mvai, 1749-1859
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- Culture: Fang
- Culture Group: Mvai
- Artist: Master of Ntem
Seated Male Figure from a Reliquary Ensemble (Bieri)
Fang, Mvai, 1749-1859
Physical Qualities
Wood, iron, copper, 18 1/2 x 5 7/8 x 5 7/8 in. (47 x 15 x 15 cm.)
Credit Line
Gift of Alan Wurtzburger
Object Number
1954.145.61
This muscular Fang figure once guarded the remains of important ancestors - individuals whose accomplishments in life were thought to give them power and authority in death. The sculpture has the strong shoulders, arms, and thighs of a mature man, as well as the shortened limbs and softly swelling forehead of an infant. This visual merging of youth and age mirrors historic Fang beliefs in the continuity between life and death.
Meditations on African Art: Light
Wurtzburger Traveling
African Reinstallation
African Gallery Rotations 2021
African Gallery Rotations 2022
African Gallery Rotations 2023
African Wing Rotations 2024
African Wing Rotations 2025
The Baltimore Museum of Art. "A Picture Book." The Baltimore Museum of Art Record, 1955: ill. p. 93.
Siegel, Katy. "Odyssey: Jack Whitten Sculpture, 1963-2017." New York: Gregory R. Miller & Co., 2018, p. 81, ill.
On View at the BMA
