Portrait Figure of Metang, the 10th King of Batufam

CC0 Public Domain Designation

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c. 1912-1914

Carved by Mbeudjang (Eastern Bangwa, active early 20th century)
Bamileke
Kingdom of Batufam, Cameroon
Coastal West Africa

This stylized portrait of Metang was commissioned around 1912, when he was initiated into kingship. The ruler holds a buffalo drinking horn and a gourd container, two of the most important regalia throughout the Bamileke kingdoms in the Cameroon Grassfields. This figure was photographed several times, always next to the entrance of the Batufam palace, arranged with a portrait of his senior wife and several other sculptures of kings and queens.

Status: On View, Gallery 137
Department: Arts of Africa

Culture: Bamileke
Artist: Mbeudjang (Carver)
Title: Portrait Figure of Metang, the 10th King of Batufam
Places: Cameroon (Object made in), Africa (Object made in)
Date: 1912-1914
Medium: Wood and pigment with traces of chalk and camwood
Dimensions: 130.5 × 43.2 × 31 cm (51 3/8 × 17 × 12 1/4 in.)
Credit Line: Major Acquisitions Centennial Endowment
Reference Number: 1997.555
IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/148330/manifest.json

Raymond Lecoq, Les Bamiléké, Une Civilisation Africaine (Paris: Éditions Africaines, 1953), figs. 92-93.
Pierre Harter, Arts Anciens du Cameroon (Arnouville: Arts d’Afrique Noire, 1986), pp. 54-57 (in situ from 1925, 1947, 1957).
Kathleen Bickford Berzock, “African Art at the Art Institute of Chicago, African Arts, vol. 32, no. 4 (Winter, 1999), pp. 18-35; 32 (ill.).
Constantine Petridis et al., Speaking of Objects: African Art at the Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2020), cat. no. 50, 124-125 (ill.).

Royal Palace, Batoufam, Cameroon by 1925 [in situ photographs in Pierre Harter, 1986]. Unknown owner, Belgium, by 1997; sold, Christies, New York, Nov. 20, 1997, sale 8780, lot 110 as A Highly Important Cameroon Grasslands Male Royal Figure, to the Art Institute.

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Portrait Figure of Metang, the 10th King of Batufam

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IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

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