{
"data": {
"id": 148159,
"accession_number": "1975.158",
"share_license_status": "CC0",
"tombstone": "Female Figure (akua'ba), late 1800s\u2013early 1900s. Africa, West Africa, Ghana, Fante-style maker. Wood, hair, resin, and bone; overall: 42.9 x 4.6 x 5.1 cm (16 7/8 x 1 13/16 x 2 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of Katherine C. White, 1975.158",
"current_location": null,
"title": "Female Figure (akua'ba)",
"creation_date": "late 1800s\u2013early 1900s",
"creation_date_earliest": 1880,
"creation_date_latest": 1920,
"artists_tags": [],
"culture": [
"Africa, West Africa, Ghana, Fante-style maker"
],
"technique": "Wood, hair, resin, and bone",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "African Art",
"collection": "African Art",
"type": "Sculpture",
"measurements": "Overall: 42.9 x 4.6 x 5.1 cm (16 7/8 x 1 13/16 x 2 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"overall": {
"height": 0.429,
"height_inch": 16,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.875,
"width": 0.046,
"width_inch": 1,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.8125,
"depth": 0.051,
"depth_inch": 2,
"depth_inch_fraction": 0.0
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": null,
"inscriptions": [],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"id": 444266,
"title": "The Arts of Ghana",
"description": "The Arts of Ghana. Frederick S. Wight Art Gallery, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA (organizer) (October 11-December 11, 1977); Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN (February 11-March 26, 1978); The Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, TX (May 3-July 2, 1978).",
"opening_date": "1977-10-11T04:00:00"
}
],
"legacy": [
{
"description": "CMA 1968: \"African Tribal Images: The Katherine White Reswick Collection,\" cat. no. 106, repr.",
"opening_date": "1968-01-01T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "CMA 1976: \"Year in Review 1975,\" CMA Bulletin LXIII (Feb., 1976), p. 65, no. 22",
"opening_date": "1976-02-01T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "Los Angeles, UCLA, Dickson Art Center, 1977-1978: \"The Arts of Ghana,\" cat. no. 212, p. 107, repr. p. 106. also traveled to Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN and Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, TX.",
"opening_date": "1977-01-01T00:00:00"
}
]
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "Katherine C. White [1929-1980], Gates Mills, OH, given to the Cleveland Museum of Art",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "at least 1968\u20131976",
"sortorder": null
},
{
"description": "The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1976\u2013",
"sortorder": 2
}
],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [],
"former_accession_numbers": [
"844.68"
],
"did_you_know": "Akua'ba are always female, both because Akua\u2019s first child was a girl, and because the Akan and Fante societies are matrilineal, meaning that it is women that extend the family line.",
"description": "An infertile woman would be advised by a priest to commission such a sculpture and care for it as if it were her baby. With the aim to induce fertility, or to ensure the birth of a healthy and beautiful daughter, the akua'ba figure is carried on the woman's back inside her wrapper. After a successful birth, the figure is placed in the priest's shrine as an offering, or it is given to the newborn as a toy.",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q60753948"
],
"internet_archive": [
"https://archive.org/details/clevelandart-1975.158-female-figure-akua-b"
]
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "Fagg, William. African Tribal Images; the Katherine White Reswick Collection. [Cleveland]: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1968.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: no. 106",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Petridis, Constantijn. South of the Sahara: Selected Works of African Art. [Cleveland]: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2003.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: P. 72-73, no. 21",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Petridis, Constantine, \"African Art Revisited\", Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland Art: The Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine. Vol. 43 no. 09, November 2003",
"page_number": "Mentioned & reproduced: 4-5",
"url": "https://archive.org/details/CMAMM2003-09/page/n3"
},
{
"citation": "Cole, Herbert M., and Doran H. Ross. The Arts of Ghana. Los Angeles: Museum of Cultural History, University of California, 1977.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 106, fig. 212; mentioned: p. 107",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Cleveland Museum of Art. Motherhood across Time. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2021.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: p. 4",
"url": ""
}
],
"url": "https://clevelandart.org/art/1975.158",
"images": {
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"date_created": "2009-10-27T19:34:15",
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],
"creditline": "Gift of Katherine C. White",
"image_credit": null,
"sketchfab_id": null,
"sketchfab_url": null,
"gallery_donor_text": null,
"athena_id": 148159,
"creators": [],
"legal_status": "accessioned",
"accession_date": "1976-01-08T00:00:00",
"sortable_date": 1880,
"date_added_to_oa": null,
"date_text": "late 1800s\u2013early 1900s",
"collapse_artists": false,
"on_loan": false,
"recently_acquired": false,
"record_type": "object",
"conservation_statement": null,
"has_conservation_images": false,
"cover_accession_number": null,
"is_nazi_era_provenance": false,
"impression": null,
"alternate_titles": [
"Female Figure (Akua'ba)"
],
"is_highlight": false,
"updated_at": "2026-05-29 07:36:57.229000"
}
}