Contemporary Vodun arts of Ouidah, Benin

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Opposite Legba in the Sacred Forest is a figure of a Fa diviner, also by Tokoudagba. In an account of the relationship between Legba and Fa, reported by Herskovits, the sixteen cowry shells placed on Legba's chest represent the sixteen eyes of Fa. (12) The latter god could not open them in the morning without assistance. Using palm kernels, Fa would communicate to Legba which of the sixteen eyes should be opened and in what order. According to the story this process developed into the complex system of Fa divination, which uses sixteen palm kernels (Herskovits 1938, vol. 2:203).

Behind Legba is Xeviosso, the spirit of thunder and lightning, constructed by the Dakpogan brothers from scrap metal and recycled car and motorcycle parts (Fig. 4). Xeviosso spits out fire (lightning), rendered in metal pipes. This identifying symbol projects from his mouth and terminates in the two staffs he carries. The image of Xeviosso is echoed across the forest in a sculpture by Simonet Biokou (Fig. 5). This piece, also composed of scrap metal and recycled car and motorcycle parts, depicts a priest holding what appears to be a censer, commonly used in Catholic Mass. Upon closer inspection, one sees that the chain to which the censer is attached terminates in the symbol of Xeviosso: the same fire he spits from his mouth in Figure 4.

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Easy for tourists to miss, this seemingly anomalous detail is neither inconspicuous nor unusual to Beninese visitors. Biokou's sculpture conflates two religious systems, an idea the artist came up with while attending a Vodun ceremony. In explaining this piece, the Sacred Forest guides say, "Voila le syncretisme ..." (13)

There is one sculpture, made by the Dakpogan brothers, which is related not to a Vodun spirit per se but to a type of power or force called cakatu, which can be sent to harm an enemy (Fig. 6). This sculpture depicts the infliction of cakatu, which can be transmitted in a variety of ways, resulting in debilitating pain inside and outside the body meant to be followed by death. Victims are said to feel as though their entire bodies were being pierced by shards of glass, nails, and metal fragments. (14)

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Additional Vodun spirits represented by contemporary sculpture in the Sacred Forest are Dan, the rainbow serpent; Gu, the god of iron, war, and technology; Loko, the god of the iroko tree inhabited by King Kpasse; Zangbeto, the guardian of the night; and others including the three-headed Indian god, Densu, known here to be the husband of Mami Wata (Drewal 1988; Rush 1999). There are also sculptures of Vodun adepts, among them a male and a female Sakpatasi, "wife" or adept of Sakpata, the spirit of the earth and disease. The display includes a variety of other supernatural characters representing specific powers, such as Tokoudagba's cement sculptures of a Janus-faced man and a one-footed man, both covered with packets of power also rendered in cement.

The Brazil House