Igbo Wood Ikenga Figure

A hand-carved wooden ikenga figure with a flared base, four curved arms extending from a narrow midsection, and a simplified face projecting from the front. The brown-toned figure wears a large headdress with trios of ovoid nodules bearing linear motifs on each side and a pair of openwork crescent horns above. Simplified ikenga are often reduced to horns set on a wooden block, the horns standing for the aggression of male animals; this is a fuller version carved with detail on all sides and was probably intended for a personal altar.