Gone but Not Forgotten: The Commemorative Arts of Benin

Abstract

This essay focuses on how the people of Benin (Nigeria) use their traditional art to formally memorialize major historical events and the life and deeds of notable citizens in their society, especially their Kings (Oba). For this purpose, they evolve diverse enigmatic symbols and artforms in sundry media and styles. In this essay, an effort is made to examine some of these artforms and the symbols used as embellishment on them, in order to determine the context in which they are utilized and how they perform their function. In the process of doing this, the stylistic and iconographic significance of the artforms and symbols are also expounded.