Yorùbá artist, Pair of twin figures (Ère Ìbejì), late 19th–early 20th century, Nigeria (Brooklyn Museum); a conversation with Dr. Peri Klemm and Dr. Steven Zucker
[0:00] [music]
Dr. Steven Zucker: [0:05] We’re in the Brooklyn Museum, and we are looking at two small wooden figures known as Ère Ìbejì. They come from the country that we now call Nigeria, they are Yoruba.
Dr. Peri Klemm: [0:14] These are twin figures. These were used by the Yoruba traditionally as receptacles for the spirits of deceased twins. The Yoruba have one of the highest twinning ratios in the world, something like 45 out of 1,000 births result in twins.
Dr. Zucker: [0:30] Twins were seen as indicative of something special. Twins are celebrated in Yoruba culture.
Dr. Klemm: [0:36] Unfortunately, twins don’t always survive, and when a mother would lose her twin, she would consult a diviner to see what she might do. In some cases a carver would be brought in to carve one of these figures to hold, as a receptacle, the spirit of that child.
Dr. Zucker: [0:52] This was something that the mother could then possess that would, in turn, hold the spirit of her deceased child. These would have been intensely personal objects.
Dr. Klemm: [1:01] They would have been kept in shrines, in her house, possibly even in her bedroom. They could have been taken out, and when they were, they would be tied and held in a cloth wrapper around her waist. They would have been offered millet gruel, and they would have been given libations, just as a child might be honored.
Dr. Zucker: [1:17] It’s important to make a distinction that although these figures are treated as if they were a child, they do not represent visually a child. What we’re seeing here are a male and female figure, and the proportions of those figures suggest an adult body rather than an infant’s body.
Dr. Klemm: [1:34] Their bodies suggest what we call the prime of life. That is, that critical time, that perfect time in life, when you are no longer a child and you haven’t yet married, but you have the knowledge, and you have the skills, and you have the energy in which to bring forth life.
[1:49] This is the ideal for parents. This is where they would like their kids to get.
Dr. Zucker: [1:53] So the potential that this particular child will not reach, but is embodied here. What we’re seeing are objects that would have been the result of this relationship between the mother and her diviner.
[2:05] The figures themselves are wonderfully abstract. The hair is abstracted and is the same on both the male and the female figure. The figures wear jewelry, and the faces seem to almost have been worn away.
Dr. Klemm: [2:18] You can tell that these figures were loved by their mother because she has touched the faces so often that the features have actually disappeared. She’s rubbed oil on them to make them glisten. She’s given them offerings of food, and in the course of time, these features have all but disappeared.
[2:37] She’s also applied red camwood onto the body as a kind of oil, which you can see residue of, and blue indigo dye to their coiffures, to their hair.
Dr. Zucker: [2:46] We’re seeing this set of relatively simple forms that are nevertheless this magnet for intense spiritual and emotional meaning.
Dr. Klemm: [2:56] The objects that we have here in the Brooklyn Museum date to the late 19th, early 20th century. While these are older pieces, this belief among the Yoruba has not died; we find women still using these Ère Ìbejìs.
[3:10] Today, they can take on new forms. They could be plastic manufactured dolls from China that a woman might find available in the marketplace, if she can’t afford to have a carver do these more elaborate types.
Dr. Zucker: [3:23] As I understand it, the concern is not with the physical form of the Ère Ìbejì themselves, but it’s with this notion of what they can hold. It’s an imbuing of power and meaning within the object rather than the object itself.
Dr. Klemm: [3:36] In many cases in African art, we see that the form is less important than what the object itself stands for or contains. I think these Ère Ìbejìs do have aesthetic qualities that are valuable to the Yoruba, but they’re also very personal, cherished objects that have the spirit, the essence, the aura of your deceased child.
[3:56] So they also have a strong connection to your past and also your future, because there is a belief that any child that dies will be reincarnated in another generation.
Dr. Zucker: [4:07] I feel very privileged to look at an object that had such a powerful connection to somebody at such a vulnerable moment in their lives.
[4:13] [music]
Ibeji Twin Figure, 19th-20th century, Nigeria, Yoruba peoples, wood, beads, cam wood powder, pigment, 9 1/4 x 3 9/16 inches (23.5 x 9 cm)
The Yoruba have one of the highest rates of twinning in the world—it is estimated that out of every 1,000 births, 45-50 result in twins. Twins are revered among the Yoruba and come into this world with the protection of the orisha (deity) Shango who is evoked at the baby’s naming ceremony when he or she is a few months old. Due to the low birth weight of twins and the high infant mortality rates in Nigeria, many twin babies do not live long. If a baby dies during childbirth, in the months leading up to the naming ceremony, the parents will seek consultation with an Ifá diviner, a Babalawo. If the Babalawo ascertains a spiritual cause, he will help the parents find a carver to create an Ere ibeji figure. An Ere ibeji is a wooden carving of a male or female figure once used by the Yoruba. The figure is thought to be a focal point for the spiritual energy of the deceased twin who, according to Yoruba traditional thought, resides in the supernatural realm where he/she is cared for by a spiritual mother.
Families, particularly grieving mothers, take comfort in the belief that a spiritual mother is caring for and guarding the departed child. The Ere ibeji is ritually washed, fed, clothed and carried in a cloth wrapper on the mother’s back as a real baby would be carried. The Ere ibeji might also be decorated with camwood powder, blue paint, beads, shells, and precious textiles. But despite the fact that this carving can serve as a receptacle for the spirit of the dead child, Ere ibeji figures do not look like children. These figures are carved to represent an ideal type within the Yoruba criteria of beauty and in the prime of life—neither a child nor an old person.
The carving style emphasizes the conical head, an elaborate hairstyle, a roundness of the eyes and facial features, and a balanced composition between the body parts. Each of these features references a moral virtue or inner goodness all children should cultivate. Ere ibeji carvings reveal not only the importance of twins and a strong belief in the afterlife, but what Yoruba regard as beautiful and correct.
Ere Ibeji, Yoruba, Nigeria, carved wood with attached personal ornaments including glass bead necklaces and girdles, metal armlets and strings of cowries attached from the wrists, 25 cm (National Museum of Scotland)
In the last fifty years, the practice of commissioning a carver to create an Ere ibeji has waned. Ere ibeji figures have become Western collector’s items and artists are now carving for the tourist market. However, the practice of using spiritual figures has not stopped, though since the 1970s some parents have chosen to use manufactured, imported dolls or photographs instead of carved figures as receptacles for the spiritual energy of the deceased. These materials are generally less expensive, worldly, and modern. While Ere ibeji carvings have a distinct style, the fact that another medium can successfully serve the same purpose suggests that for the Yoruba, art is dynamic and flexible. While Western collectors demand an Ere ibeji that is similar to the image above, Yoruba practitioners were not constrained by a stylistic cannon and specific materials. For indigenous users, it is the concept behind this art making practice that is most important.
