Ọbàtálá Shrine Complex: A Trio of Small Sculptures by Wenger

This photo shows three of the earliest small cement sculptures by Susanne Wenger, founder of the New Sacred Art Movement. She was, around this time, encouraging Adebisi Akanji and other artists of the Movement to create works of art reflecting their Yoruba traditions. She mentored them to experiment with cement and to create works that maintained the attributes of the deities sculpted in wood by traditional ritual woodcarvers but in a bold new style that was all their own.
These pieces have a playful and surrealist quality resulting from that period of experimentation in the early sixties.
As with all the Shrines and works of art in the Sacred Groves, these were created using cement, reinforced by iron rods and netting. To save money at the time, mud was used in the core and then covered with cement. Over time the mud core weakened and the sculptures collapsed. This trio of sculptures was completely reconstructed in 2016 by Adebisi Akanji. This time only cement with metal reinforcement were used, and as such, the sculptures should last forever, requiring only periodic maintenance.