Maternity

Baulé statuettes can either represent the spirits of the forest (asie usu) or the “spouses of the afterlife” (blolo bian and blolo bla). Asie usu spirits are described as horrifying, but they are represented as good-looking, in hopes of appeasing their wrath. Their representations are identical, in shape and style, to those of the “spouses of the afterlife”. According to the Baulé, when people are born they abandon their otherworldly spouse. People thus get figurines sculpted the way the spouse wishes to be portrayed, to avoid his or her wrath (which manifests itself as disease, sterility, impotence). In this case the figure is shaped like a mother with child (maternity being a central social value); the seated posture and the stool are signs of high social status. The elongated breasts allude to breast feeding.