Ancient Dogon maternity - Dogon - Mali (No reserve price)

The Dogons are a people of Mali, in West Africa. Their total population in Mali is estimated at 700,000 people. They occupy the region named the Dogon Country, which runs from the Bandiagara Cliff to the southwest of the Niger bend. Some Dogons are settled in northern Burkina Faso, others have settled in Côte d'Ivoire.

The Dogons are above all cultivators (primarily millet) and blacksmiths. They are renowned for their cosmogony and their sculptures. The language spoken by the Dogons is Dogon, which groups together several dialects. There is also a secret language, sigi so, a language reserved for the mask society. The Dogons are linked with the Bozo ethnicity by joking kinship (called sinankunya in Mali). Dogons and Bozos mock each other, but, in parallel, they owe each other mutual assistance.

In Mali, the Dogons are the heirs of an exceptional ethnic artistic tradition: Each work of art bears witness to the intimacy of families—works are not intended to be seen but rather kept in the shadowy interiors of houses, as in a sanctuary—and to the representation of a unique cosmogony that structures daily life like the rhythm and rituals of societal or initiatory ceremonies.