Barbara E. Frank

Marks of identity : Potters of the folona (Mali) and their mothers

| african arts SPRING 2007 A potter of the Folona region in southern Mali marks the wet clay of her pots with a unique sign, a mark that is passed down from mother to daughter along with favorite tools of the trade and the technical knowledge to employ them (figs. 1–2).1 Once dry, the pots are fi red in huge communal fi rings of as many as 800 pieces at a time. Th e women say they have no trouble distinguishing their pots from those of other women in the village, even without these signatures. Marking the pots is simply something they have always done. It is a mark of their artistry and, I would argue, of their identity and heritage as well. Th e past always leaves a mark. Over time these marks compete with one another in the historical consciousness of people. Some become obscured beneath layers of events as traumatic as warfare and slavery; as life-altering as birth, marriage, and death; or as mundane as working in the fi elds, tanning hides, or making pottery. Th e challenge of reconstructing the history of creative expression is especially great in parts of West Africa where artists are minorities whose histories are subsumed within the larger concerns of the dominant population—they may have a diff erent language, different religion, different marriage patterns, and different customs. Th is becomes even more diffi cult when the artists are women, whose own identities and histories may become hidden beneath those of their husbands. My focus is a group of women potters from the Folona region of southeastern Mali whom I fi rst encountered on a collaborative documentation and collection project with the National Museum of Mali in 1991.2 Th e dominant ethnic population in the region is Senufo, with language and cultural ties to other Senufo peoples to the south and east. Th e potters of this area identify themselves as Dyula,3 and they provide virtually all of the pottery for both Senufo and Dyula households in the region. Th ey speak a dialect of the Mande language shared Marks of Identity

Ceramic arts in Africa

| african arts SPRING 2007 It has been nearly two decades since African Arts published the special issue on African ceramic arts edited by Marla Berns (1989, vol. 22, no. 2). Since then, there has been noteworthy collaborative research on ceramics in particular regions, a number of important localized studies by individual scholars, and several widely distributed catalogues published in conjunction with major exhibitions surveying African ceramic arts. In parts of Africa where ceramic vessels are pervasive some are clearly the focus of artistic elaboration, whether they serve as objects of both utility and beauty in domestic settings or carry symbolic import central to social identity, economic and political status, ritual practice, and belief. Their study reveals the skill and invention of their makers, who are, more often than not, women.1 And yet, ceramics continue to be underrepresented in Africanist art historical literature in proportion to their importance as a form of expressive culture, and signifi cant gaps remain in our awareness and understanding of historic and contemporary ceramic traditions across Africa. This issue brings together the research of a number of scholars whose work exemplifi es some of what has been accomplished in the last two decades.2 The articles foreground important themes in the study of African ceramic arts, most especially documentation and historical reconstruction, iconographic analysis, the elucidation of ritual and social signifi cance, and the celebration of individual artistry. In this introduction we offer some refl ections on our experiences researching and writing about African ceramic arts and we signal some of the limitations of the fi eld’s current state of knowledge in an effort to spark interest in future research. Ceramic Arts in Africa

Ceramic Arts in Africa: Field Research and Making Objects Speak

| 13 with many of the most spectacular made specifi cally to be placed on shrines (fig. 4). Robert F. Th ompson’s seminal 1969 article on the Egbado-Yoruba potter Àbátàn remains the most in-depth study of an exceptional potter’s work and the meaning and signifi cance of a particular kind of shrine vessel. In 1972 Maude Wahlman published a valuable comparative study of pottery techniques in two Yoruba regions. Th is was followed in the 1980s and 1990s with multiple publications (including Beier 1980, Ojo 1982, Isaacs 1988, Fatunsin 1992, Ibigbami 1982 and 1992, and Allsworth-Jones 1996) which survey various techniques and uses for pots; however, none of these studies approach the depth of critical inquiry presented in Th ompson’s work. Likewise, the captions for the four shrine vessels illustrated in the catalogue of the landmark exhibition Yoruba: Nine Centuries of African Art and Th ought reveal intriguing details that remain unexplored in larger studies (Drewal et al. 1989:161, fi g. 177, and 226, fi gs. 2679). We are told for instance, that the shape of one lidded pot is found most oft en on Erinle shrines, but its iconography is usually associated with Sango (ibid., 160-61). Another describes “a ritual vessel possibly for Yemoja, goddess of the river Ogun ... transformed into a woman’s body whose breasts sustain life in feeding a child” (ibid., p. 226). Th ese tantalizing descriptions suggest the great, untapped potential of Yoruba pottery as an area of research, just as the remarkably varied vessels in the Achepohl collection hint at the artistry that can be found in pottery from many other parts of Africa.