Kaka – the only cultural group using rare paternity figures?

Keaka or Kaka ?

The Kaka people live near the Donga River, partly in Cameroon and partly in Nigeria. The Keaka, an Ejagham subgroup also known as the Eastern Ejagham, live near the Cross River in Cameroon close to the Nigerian border. We know little about their traditions. The Keaka neighbour the Banyang and live to the West of the Bangwa.
The Keaka statuary is rare and poorly documented. Otherwise, there are similarities with their neighbours, Chamba and Mumuye, and of course with Ejagham.

Since the 1960’s, Nigerian art has arrived in Europe and in the United States following Biafra civil war (1967-1970). Little known before that time, Nigerian art – and especially that from the Cross River (Igbo, Mumuye) – started to appear in French collections and was displayed in museums and galleries.

Rare Kaka figure representing paternity

Kaka – the only cultural group using rare paternity figures?

Generally, we find maternity symbols in African Art, but some specific pieces represent paternity.
The male figures carrying a child on the back [1] are attributed to the Kaka/Keaka people.

According to Pierre Harter, these figures are used in an ancestral ritual. But, in contrast, Viviane Baeke suggests that these sculptures belong to the so medicinal ritual. But according to F. Hermann, the Keaka people could be the only cultural group with this kind of figure, the paternity sculpture.

Field studies made by Hans-Joachim Koloss present the male figures as « power figures », named enoke ateng – « fighting alone ».

What we understand about paternity figures is associated with so association, known in this border region. Laburthe-Tolra suggested that old initiated men became like women, with the ability to give birth. Then, new initiation candidates know a « social birth ». This particularity is symbolized by the child in the back of male figures.

Morphological characteristics of these male standing figures are bent legs and arms, an elongated body, ending with a head, schematically shaped, with a « beard » or a « V » hair style. The face is often carved with a cavity for the mouth and, sometimes, only vertical lines for the teeth. The patina is another important element that gives strength and mystery to these male figures. Looking at all paternity figures, some of them are taller (elongated) than others (stocky).

(1)This sculpture is displayed in Marie-Louise Bastin’s book published in 1984 (p. 228, n° 229).
(2) In past auctions, rare Keaka « paternity » figures were sold; one, from the Gaud collection, in 1993 in Sotheby’s London (lot 95)

 

[1] See figures: 229 (Keaka denomination, carrying a turtle, not a child) in Bastin (1984, 228); 184 (Kaka denomination) in Lebas (2012, 254); Keaka figure in Claes (2015, 44).

Provenance

Galerie Robert Duperrier, Paris

Editor

Coryse Mwape Dolin
Art Historian, African Arts

Bibliography

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A. Bamert.- Afrika Stammeskunst in Urwald und Savanne. Olten, 1980. p. 153, n° 152.
Marie-Louise Bastin.- Introduction aux Arts d’Afrique noire. Arnouville, Arts d’Afrique Noire, 1984. p. 228, n° 229.
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