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Source Description
This is an idealized portrait of an Akan royal. The Akan states formed in West Africa around the 1400s. Akan royal family members commissioned terracotta portraits like this from female artists during someone’s life. Following their death and burial, the family placed these sculptures in a sacred grove. The woman who sculpted this head over 300 years ago worked from memory, without sketches. The resulting sculpture combined idealized physical qualities of elite figures with individual details. The hairstyle and skin color of this portrait reflect its subject’s individuality. In contrast, his calm expression reflects the desired “cool composure” of elites.
Scholar Source Context
Document identity
localId
155499
label
Memorial head (nsodie)
core
obj
dtoType
sculpture
pageCount
1
Source metadata
id
155499
contentType
sculpture
title
Memorial head (nsodie)
description
This is an idealized portrait of an Akan royal. The Akan states formed in West Africa around the 1400s. Akan royal family members commissioned terracotta portraits like this from female artists during someone’s life. Following their death and burial, the family placed these sculptures in a sacred grove. The woman who sculpted this head over 300 years ago worked from memory, without sketches. The resulting sculpture combined idealized physical qualities of elite figures with individual details. The hairstyle and skin color of this portrait reflect its subject’s individuality. In contrast, his calm expression reflects the desired “cool composure” of elites.
date
late 1600s–early 1700s
citation
rights
CC0
rightsUri
CC0
language
en
wikidata
Q60740206
genreSpecific
Sculpture
imageCount
1
source
import
dimensionsRaw
Overall: 19.1 x 13.6 x 15.5 cm (7 1/2 x 5 3/8 x 6 1/8 in.)
cul
Ghana, Akan-style sculpture, unknown female ceramicist
accession
1990.22
Source extras
tec
Terracotta
tombstone
Memorial head (nsodie), late 1600s–early 1700s. Ghana, Akan-style sculpture, unknown female ceramicist. Terracotta; overall: 19.1 x 13.6 x 15.5 cm (7 1/2 x 5 3/8 x 6 1/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Edwin R. and Harriet Pelton Perkins Memorial Fund, 1990.22
collection
African Art
didYouKnow
The woman who sculpted this head did so without making a sketch, working from her memory of the subject.
citations
citation
Turner, Evan H. “Acquisitions: 1990.” <em>The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art </em>78, no. 2 (February 1991): 44, no. 62, repr. p. 36.
citation
Young-Sánchez, Margaret. "The Cleveland Museum of Art." <em>African Arts</em> 30, no. 1 (1997): 66-71, p .68.
citation
Petridis, Constantijn. <em>South of the Sahara: Selected works of African Art</em>. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2003. Reproduced: cat. 20, p. 70 – 71.
page_number
Reproduced: cat. 20, p. 70 - 71
citation
Cleveland Museum of Art. <em>The CMA Companion: A Guide to the Cleveland Museum of Art</em>. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2014.
page_number
Mentioned and reproduced: P. 30-31
creditline
Edwin R. and Harriet Pelton Perkins Memorial Fund
updatedAt
2026-05-29 08:03:20.987000
sourceId
155499
dept
African Art
coll
African Art
med
Terracotta
thumbnail_url
image_url
Single page context
seq
1
pageIndex
0
type
photo
mediaId
1cb90f48ea011b79