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The Song dynasty (960–1279) is considered the most culturally brilliant era in later imperial Chinese history. A massive expansion during this dynasty produced government, public and religious buildings and tombs with walls decorated with earthenware unglazed mold-made brick tiles. Some were purely decorative and others were wishes for happiness and comfort in the deceased’s afterlife…
During the Song dynasty, mold made unglazed earthenware brick tiles decorated the doors and walls of the government, private religious buildings as well as the doors and tomb walls of the rich used as funerary decorations (mingqi) to wish the deceased happiness and comfort in their afterlife. This thin brick presents two images. The figure…
This rare, vintage spirit mask is from Timor in Indonesia. Their animism is characterized by ritual exchanges between individuals or social groups with ancestral and fertility spirits having a close reciprocal link between the deceased and the secular world as ancestors require sustenance, respect and attention (i.e. offerings), while humans seek advice, good fortune, health…
This rare vintage carving was likely made for home shrine or small rice field temple dedicated to Dewi Sri, the Balinese Goddess of Rice. Likely part of a larger decorative scheme, she is presented as a beautiful young woman wearing an elaborate headdress and a rich garment with arm and wristbands and an intricate neck…
One of the three largest ethnic groups in Nigeria, Benin and Togo numbering over 20 million, Yoruba are among the most skilled African craftsmen. Traditional Yoruba religion has a complex hierarchy of deities comprised of a supreme creator with some 400 lesser gods and spirits. Having one of the world’s highest rates of twin births…
This Dalem is a traditional folk-art and ethnic mask (topeng) from Bali made from pulai wood of a Hindu king (Dalem). He stares directly at the viewer while his high cheeks help express his poise and the ability to remain cool in a crisis. This is a fine example of a gifted carver able to…
The culture, rituals, tribal and ethnic art of the Dayak (Dyak) of Kalimantan (Borneo), Indonesia is a mix of shamanism, animism and ancestor worship. Dyak festival masks worn on the face or large ones attached to a costume repel malicious spirits from entering communal spaces, insure village safety, protect babies in their carriers and defend…
The Dayak (Dyak) people live on the Island of Kalimantan in the Indonesia part of Borneo and their hudoq masks are offerings to attract gods, ancestors and sacred rice spirits that assure the fertility of rice and protect villages. They are tribal, folk and ethnic objects that may not only worn on the face; they…
The religion of the ethnic Dayak (Dyak) people of Kalimantan (Borneo), Indonesia is a mix of animism, shamanism and ancestor worship. Their word hudoq describes three different things: it describes the pests that can destroy the rice harvest on which their survival depends; the name of the huge yearly Dyak planting celebration and the name…
This very fine and very beautiful vintage woodcarving of Dewi Sri , Devi Sri or Sridevi in Java, the Balinese Hindu goddess of rice and prosperity, is in excellent condition considering it is a much used vintage piece. Personally collected in Bali in the 1970s, it reflects the offerings made to Dewi Sri placed in the rice fields to protect the rice harvest. She is depicted here as a young, attractive and fertile woman wearing a striking, highly detailed and decorative headdress similar to those worn in Balinese dances leaving her upper forehead bare and framing her oval face with high curved eyebrows, wide-open eyes and beautiful pursed lips. With its flat back it can be mounted on a wall.
Ibeji carvings from Nigeria are idealized folk art conforming to Yoruba artistic and cultural conventions without closely reflecting human likenesses. Symmetrical and restrained with oversized elongated heads where one’s spirit, intelligence and the seat of divine power lie, they often have detailed linear coiffures that can be a third or more of the figure’s body…
Javanese Wayang (puppet theater) Topeng (literally “pressed against the face” or mask) is a very refined dance form accompanied by gamelan music. In Bali Topeng tua is the charming dance of an old courtier’s fragile movements, his lack of control and his gathering energy for a short lively dance. He sits behind a cloth curtain,…
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