Senufo Used Foot Stool, African Tribal Creations, art poro chair Senoufo Mali

This NO RESERVE auction is for a used small Senufo foot stool.  A large ethnic group extending across Cote d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Mali, and Ghana, the Senufo are revered among African art collectors, if only for a single mask known as the Kponyungo or Firespitter mask.  They are, however, prolific art producers, making a number of exquisite masks and figures, as well as functional items including doors and stools that are beautifully embellished.  Minimal hunters and fishers, they are primarily an agrarian society both growing crops and keeping small domesticated livestock.  The community is structured around the poro society, to which all adult men belong.  This society is responsible for maintaining the religious, artistic, and historical traditions of a lineage, and it is for this society that the majority of Senufo art is created.

A prolific producer of artistic functional items, the Senufo frequently make various seating items from chairs to stools to latters and so on.  This small example is a footstool used for stepping up to access out of reach items in and around the home.  We're told it was also used as a child's stool to sit on.  The condition of the piece is fair, displaying considerable use, with heavy wear on the edges and on the bottom of the legs.  Age cracking in the wood is pronounced, and most of the surface is heavily worn.  Despite obvious wear, the piece does not appear to have undergone any noteworthy breaks or repairs.  Pieces like these do not frequently fall into our collection, so grab it while you have the opportunity!  

Dimensions are 7" x 7.25" in diameter, and it weighs in at just under three pounds.

Medium:  Wood