Mami Wata Figure

This figure represents "Mami Wata," the pidgin English term for "Mother of Water," a water spirit who has enjoyed a wide following in Central Africa, West Africa, and regions of the African Diaspora. It was carved by an Ibibio artist living in Nigeria. In Ibibio thought, the otherworld exists in contrast to the world of physical reality. It is a world of the dead as well as of malevolent and benevolent spirits, including Mami Wata, whose particular domain is the watery otherworld beneath rivers and creeks. She is a charismatic spirit, a seductive temptress who bestows good fortune and material wealth on followers as long as they do not break their "contract" with her, in which case she may inflict laziness, madness, infertility, sickness, and other maladies.

Representations of Mami Wata generally depict her as a woman with light skin and long dark hair, wreathed in snakes. Her luxuriant long hair refers to the dada locks worn by spiritually marked individuals, and the snakes are pythons sacred in West African belief. Mami Wata reveals herself to future devotees through recurring dreams, physical maladies, or unusual behavior. In consultation with a diviner a person many discover they are a chosen one of Mami Wata. Establishing a shrine to Mami Wata will please and honor her, thereby bringing to an end any maladies and problems previously experienced. The physical form that sculptures like this one take is derived from knowledge of her gained by both the client and the artist through their dreams of her.

The altar on which this shrine figure once stood would have been densely packed with offerings like alcohol, perfume, talcum powder, plastic jewelry, and other imported luxury goods, all spiritual magnets to attract Mami Wata so that her presence and support are assured. The shrines of Mami Wata devotees reflect their very personal relationships with the spirit. Through dreams and visions, devotees journey to Mami Wata's fabulous underwater realm. These aquatic excursions are evoked in the shrine through the use of white, blue and green colors and the inclusion of boats, canoes, fish, wavy lines, and aquatic plants. It is this inward, lived experience of the dream world where devotee and deity meet that is externalized and reified in the carved art work and shrine environment.