Summary

Elephant Tusk with Scenes of African life   (  )
Artist	Anonymous (Congo)Unknown author
Title	Elephant Tusk with Scenes of African life
Description	English: The tusk is carved in high relief with a procession of figures in a rising spiral. It is thought to have been carved by the Vili people of Loango for the French traders who dominated the area. The scenes, which read from the bottom, show a war between two African peoples, in which the defeated are roped and led away; a sailor woodworking; coconuts being picked; a trader selling gin; prisoners being led off for sale as slaves; a European lighting his cigar; fishermen carrying large fish; a procession of dignitaries; the execution of criminals; goods and ivory being brought for sale; another procession of dignitaries, who salute a European in a wicker chair; the preparing of a pig and other food for a banquet; a procession; the arrest of a wrong-doer; a procession; and an execution. The top is carved with a gorilla eating a banana and scratching his side. The costumes suggest a mid-century date, and the Africans in the procession are shown in printed European cotton textiles. There are many distinctions in rank among the Africans, as indicated by their costume, hats, and jewelry, and by specific symbols, for example an umbrella. Other similar tusks are known, the earliest of which was purchased between 1839 and 1867 by the French admiral Fleuriot de Langle.
Date	between 1850 and 1860 date QS:P571,+1850-00-00T00:00:00Z/7,P1319,+1850-00-00T00:00:00Z/9,P1326,+1860-00-00T00:00:00Z/9
Medium	ivory medium QS:P186,Q82001
Dimensions	height: 108 cm (42.5 in); width: 22.4 cm (8.8 in); depth: 10.1 cm (3.9 in) dimensions QS:P2048,108U174728 dimensions QS:P2049,22.4U174728 dimensions QS:P5524,10.1U174728
Collection	Walters Art Museum    Native name Walters Art Museum Location Baltimore, United States of America Coordinates 39° 17′ 48″ N, 76° 36′ 58″ W   Established 1934  Website thewalters.org Authority file : Q210081 VIAF: 128918374 ISNI: 000000040373611X ULAN: 500279110 LCCN: no00096900 GND: 16029354-6 WorldCat institution QS:P195,Q210081
Accession number	71.586
Place of creation	Loango, Congo
Object history	Tiffany & Company, New York [date and mode of acquisition unknown], Henry Walters, Baltimore, ca. 1910, by purchase 1931: bequeathed to Walters Art Museum by Henry Walters
Exhibition history	Through African Eyes: The European in African Art, 1500-Present. The Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit; The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City. 2010-2011.
Credit line	Acquired by Henry Walters, ca. 1910
Source	Walters Art Museum: Home page  Info about artwork
Permission (Reusing this file)	This work is free and may be used by anyone for any purpose. If you wish to use this content, you do not need to request permission as long as you follow any licensing requirements mentioned on this page. The Wikimedia Foundation has received an e-mail confirming that the copyright holder has approved publication under the terms mentioned on this page. This correspondence has been reviewed by a Volunteer Response Team (VRT) member and stored in our permission archive. The correspondence is available to trusted volunteers as ticket #2012021710000834. If you have questions about the archived correspondence, please use the VRT noticeboard. Ticket link: https://ticket.wikimedia.org/otrs/index.pl?Action=AgentTicketZoom&TicketNumber=2012021710000834 Find other files from the same ticket:
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This file was provided to Wikimedia Commons by the Walters Art Museum as part of a cooperation project. All artworks in the photographs are in public domain due to age. The photographs of two-dimensional objects are also in the public domain. Photographs of three-dimensional objects and all descriptions have been released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License and the GNU Free Documentation License. In the case of the text descriptions, copyright restrictions only apply to longer descriptions which cross the threshold of originality. العربيَّة | English | français | italiano | македонски | русский | sicilianu | +/−

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