The Luba lived in the vast region between the Congo River and Lake Tanganyika. Their monarchy was centralized and powerful. Around 1900 their royal art began to be studied, enabling to identify the creations of two artists who probably lived in the time of the height of that empire a few decades earlier.
The continuous movement of the tribes has a consequence that African art is not local but mixed with neighboring influences. The two major artists whose figuration is very different have also a Hemba influence.
Both executed altogether fetishes and utilitarian objects for royal ceremonies such as caryatid seats and cups, and bow stands. This duality explains the regular proportions in the body whose geometry is perfectly balanced without being realistic.
The figures are often a woman or a mixed janus. The fetishes are related to spirits whose incorporation into a woman's body is likened to a pregnancy. The traditions of hermaphrodite figures were probably already abandoned at the time of the two masters.
The Buli Master may in fact apply to two or three different or subsequent artists. A beautifully carved caryatid seat was sold for € 5.4 million including premium by Sotheby's on 30 November 2010.
The Warua Master is probably one artist because of the similarity of the faces in the works collected under that name which is no more than a bad old phonetic for Luba or Baluba.
A very rare Luba male figure made by the Warua Master, 42 cm high, is estimated $ 3M for sale by Sotheby's in New York on May 15, lot 107.
The continuous movement of the tribes has a consequence that African art is not local but mixed with neighboring influences. The two major artists whose figuration is very different have also a Hemba influence.
Both executed altogether fetishes and utilitarian objects for royal ceremonies such as caryatid seats and cups, and bow stands. This duality explains the regular proportions in the body whose geometry is perfectly balanced without being realistic.
The figures are often a woman or a mixed janus. The fetishes are related to spirits whose incorporation into a woman's body is likened to a pregnancy. The traditions of hermaphrodite figures were probably already abandoned at the time of the two masters.
The Buli Master may in fact apply to two or three different or subsequent artists. A beautifully carved caryatid seat was sold for € 5.4 million including premium by Sotheby's on 30 November 2010.
The Warua Master is probably one artist because of the similarity of the faces in the works collected under that name which is no more than a bad old phonetic for Luba or Baluba.
A very rare Luba male figure made by the Warua Master, 42 cm high, is estimated $ 3M for sale by Sotheby's in New York on May 15, lot 107.
#AuctionUpdate: Luba Male Statue by the Warua Master fetches $3.6m in the NY African, Oceanic, and Pre-Col sale pic.twitter.com/0pEqXt5435
— Sotheby's (@Sothebys) May 15, 2015
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