The Mossi Doll
51
To understand the trend towards abstraction we have to advance a general theory
applicable also to African art. The degree of abstraction is connected with an intense
fervor, usually religious, in pre- and early historic times, in most of the non-literate
cultures, at the time of the emergence of Christianity, which produced a selfforgetting
passion in abstract ideas about the spirit, the gods, etc. Elie Faure formulated it in this
manner: when a new and exciting idea comes into being, it is expressed In artworks
of abstracted forms; when the idea has lost its exciting newness, artists concentrate
their efforts on perfecting the previously invented forms. A good example can be
taken from the late neolithic (6000 B. C.) when at Halicar, Anatolia, maternity
statues were made which still had the exaggerated breasts, belly, buttocks, and small
head without mouth, but showing a marked departure from the pure abstraction
of the early neolithic towards a degree of naturalism.
b. Early historic fertility figures. A different style and very strong abstract
tendency can be noted in this period which can be dated between 3000 and 2000 B. C.
Here the figures, mostly in clay and marble, have a flat frontal aspect; many are
without limbs, some without head, in contrast to the strong three-dimensional form
of the earlier periods. These female goddesses come from Mesopotamia, the near
East and the Aegean civilizations.
It is evident that these statues are not in phallic form; their specific concern was
about female fertility, but nevertheless they illustrate the fact that abstract concepts
are put into abstracted forms with main emphasis on that part of the human body
which aims to suggest symbolically the very function for which they stand. The