AFRICAN ARTS OF HEALING AND DIVINATION

Art, Divination and Healing in Burkina Faso and Ghana: researching the exhibition “African Arts of Healing and Divination”, Harn Museum of Art, 2007

Susan Cooksey, Curator of African Art, Samuel P. Harn Museum of Art

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Summary of Research, 2006

Figure 1 click image to enlarge

In spring of 2006, I traveled to Burkina Faso, Mali and Ghana with the assistance of a CAHRE grant for the purpose of conducting research on the arts of healing and divination. This research was done as a follow-up to my earlier study in Burkina Faso of diviners in 1997-1999, which was the catalyst for an exhibition, “African arts of Healing and Divination” at the Harn Museum of Art, of the University of Florida, open from February 20, 2007 to June 24, 2007 1. My research in 2006 was done in a period of a little over three weeks. It included revisiting my former research site, the village Toussiana in southwest Burkina Faso, as well as visits to Ouagadougou and Bobo-Dioulasso in Burkina Faso, Kumasi and Accra in Ghana, and Bamako, Mali. The following discussion focuses on research in Toussiana and in Kumasi. In Toussiana, I was a participant-observer in divination and healing ceremonies and in a ceremony honoring a deceased diviner. Also in Toussiana, I observed and interviewed Dafing weavers who produce sacred textiles for divination, and acquired examples of their work, and other comparative examples from other sources. In Kumasi, I interviewed the artist, Kwame Akoto in his workshop, and commissioned two paintings about current health issues, one of which is included in the Harn exhibition.

Description of Primary Research Site: Toussiana
Toussiana is a village in southwestern Burkina Faso, with roughly 20,000 inhabitants. (Figure 1) It is close to the borders of Cote d’Ivoire and Mali, and located on the Falaise de Banfora, a rocky plateau. The plateau is forested near Toussiana, and rivers traverse the area, which also boasts a manmade lake or barrage. The area is mainly agricultural and pastoral, with many farming hamlets within a 20 mile radius of the village centers. Toussiana is approximately 20 miles from the nearest town, Banfora, and about 40 miles from Bobo-Dioulasso, the second largest city in Burkina Faso. Toussiana is comprised of three villages, Toussianba, Yorokofasso, and Nianhaba. Each has its own local chiefs, although the provincial government office is located in Toussianba. In the wake of French colonization in the early 20th century, the Père Blancs, founded a mission and a school in Toussianba, which is thriving today as one of the premier educational institutions in the country. While Catholicism is strong in Toussianba, religious affiliations in the three village area include protestant Christian sects, as well as Muslims and local or indigenous religions, with much syncretization. Important local religions include the worship of the deity, Do, an earth spirit, and several spirits, with lively cults devoted to the spirits Boro and Kuruba. Ethnically, there are no longer clear divisions of groups, however the main population self-identifies as Win (also called the southern Toussian or Tusyan). The nearest related group, the Pentobe, are known as the northern Toussian. Both are culturally related to the Senufo peoples, and the Toussian groups have been referred to as the northern Senufo, due to cutural and linguistic similarities. Other neighboring peoples, the Turka, Karaboro, Tiefo, Dafing, Fulani and Gouin, are only a few that live in the southwestern region of Burkina Faso but have had the most significant cultural impact on the Win. Many peoples from the north, such as the Mossi and Bwa, as well as the Lobi from the east have settled in Toussiana recently, due to reversal of a long trend of migrations to urban areas.

Divination and Healing in Toussiana
In the pluralistic society of Toussiana, there is a great diversity of practitioners of divination and healing. The two professions are complementary and overlap although some broad distinctions may be made between them. Diviners are sometimes differentiated from healers in that the former are considered to have spiritually endowed insight that allows them to solve many problems, and the latter concentrate on remedies for purely physical ailments. In a sense, diviners are all healers if one considers that they diagnose and treat the cause of physical and psychological disorders, which is generally thought to be spiritual. Diviners do know the difference between a purely physiological problem that requires immediate medical attention and one that is caused by god or a spirit, and will refer a client to the appropriate health professional—a traditional healer or physician in an urban clinic. The diviners can be divided into five major groups: the hierarchical diviners comprising the great diviners, or sanpu gbe, the lesser diviners, the sanpu or gbintalesanpu; blacksmith diviners of the Kwen people; idiosyncratic diviners; Muslim diviners; and outsider diviners, or those who have come from distant areas and settled in Toussiana. Each of these groups has distinctive practices, although there is some overlap in use of materials, objects and techniques. For example, various diviners have mutual knowledge of certain oracular techniques and materials, or of herbal remedies. This sharing of knowledge is most evident among the hierarchical diviners, however, small diviners are closely linked by their oracular techniques with the blacksmith diviners. Idiosyncratic and outsider diviners have appropriated some of these techniques, and have also borrowed techniques and materials from Muslim diviners. In addition, many attend the same religious ceremonies, such as Do initiations, Boro and Kuruba ritual dances, diviner initiations and divinatory funerary rites. Although more study on the subject is called for, it seems that the exchange of ideas and information among diviners, and other interactions enhances their visibility and status among other practitioners and among members of the larger community.

Hierarchical Divination: Sanpu Gbe and Sanpu
The oldest type of diviners in Toussiana are probably the great diviners, or sanpu gbe (sanwo gbe, singular). Their calling as diviners is mandated by each family’s tutelary nature spirit, which usually identifies a successor to the current family diviner as a younger family member, usually male, but women may be named as well.

The spiritual link to the local terrain, in the form of spirits of the rivers, forest and mountains, is of great importance to these diviners, and presumably is founded on deep historical roots in the area. Great diviners distinguish themselves from small diviners by this strong connection to the land and the spirits that inhabit it, by saying that the lesser diviners are so named because they do not inherit the ability to divine but are called at random by the spirits. It may be that the sanpu gbe consider themselves the original landowners, the first diviners, and that the sanpu are either latecomers to the area, or imported divination techniques from elsewhere. In either case, the great diviners are allied with the lesser diviners, but are considered superior. The elected chief diviner of the sanpu gbe is the leader of the sanpu, who have their own chiefs, usually a highly experienced elder. The alliance of these two types of diviners is a mystery, made more pronounced by the great differences in their practices. Divination may be considered a two part process, consisting of a consultation, in which a problem is identified and a solution is prescribed, and, a cure or therapeutic part that is undertaken by the client. Sanpu gbe are consulted for many everyday problems, but their most important role is determining a cause of death, whereas sanpu divinations are exclusively for everyday problems. The sanpu gbe’s post-mortem oracular pronouncement is part of a large public funerary ceremony, attended by scores of people. The sanpu consultations are only held in small, private rooms. While both utilize techniques that involve interlocution and may be described as oracular and mediumistic, there are few other evident parallels.

Aesthetic Space and Divination
Divination systems worldwide share a common denominator of involving both performance and objects to find solutions to problems. Insight into a problem is credited as transmitted by a spirit being to the diviner, who may then pronounce a solution, usually an offering to a displeased spirit. Western scholars, including myself (2004, also see Peek, 1992; Pemberton, 2000) have argued it is the presentation and manipulation of objects in a highly aestheticized setting that enables an alteration in cognition, and results in new insights to old problems. Construction of such an aestheticized space is evident in many phases of the divination process, but among the Toussiana diviners, it was most effective in the consultation with the diviner, inside his or her chamber. In the case of the sanpu gbe funerary divination ceremony, this aesthetic space was expanded or at least transformed.

For everyday problems, a sanpu or sanpu gbe consultation occurs within a small specially designed house, separated from other living quarters. For the sanpu gbe, the house is generally a large round house with two opposing doors and no windows.

Figure 2

(Figure 2) A client enters the sanpu gbe house after removing her shoes, and is directed to sit on a smooth stone on the opposite side of a small stone table from the diviner. The house is empty except for the presence of a leather bag hanging on the wall, and remnants of sacrificial substances.

The diviner begins the session by chanting, and removing his equipment from a leather bag—a cowhorn filled with cowrie shells, metal rings, and bits of other materials. He spills the contents of the horn on the table, then taps the horn on the stone slab top of the table, which that has air pockets inside so that various tones are produced by striking it in different spots. This sounding stone is thought to have magical properties, which make it useful for conveying spiritual messages. The spilled contents of the horn are examined, and the configuration of shells, metal rings and other individualized contents (e.g. a knucklebone and a bit of red glass), and interpreted as a spirit’s responses to the diviner’s queries about the client’s problem. The contents are gathered into the horn and recast until the diviner identifies the cause of the problem. After pronouncing the cause, he then queries the spirits to find a solution. A solution may take the form of a series of actions the client must take, such as acquiring specific types of objects, and performing certain tasks with them.

Within the sanpu gbe personal consultation, it is the sound of the horn tapping the stone and the visually arresting sight of the contents of the horn that are the salient aesthetic experiences, but other objects in the chamber, hidden from the client’s view, play a major role in mediation with the spirit world. Tasie, small carved wood male and female paired figures are among the more interesting of these objects that are made for interlocution. According to an earlier study, these figures assisted the diviner with consultations, and actually seemed to speak with the voice of a deceased child. The child oracle was in fact a diviner acting as a ventriloquist. During my research, however, the tasie remained hidden within a large leather bag. Hiding the tasie was probably the result of earlier colonial persecution of diviners, who were identified by their possession and use of such figures, which were wrongly associated with sorcery.

A Sanpu Gbe Funerary Oracle

Figure 3

After the death of an individual, a sanpu gbe is called in to perform a public ceremony to determine the cause of death. This determination is critical to the deceased’s family and it is also of great interest to them and to the community, because they will know whether the person died from either good or evil causes. Good causes include natural aging process, and one’s personal spirit calling her to join him in the spirit world. If a person is killed by a witch or sorcerer, or from any evil spirit force, activated by human agents or otherwise, (referred to as poisoning) then it is considered an unnatural death. In such cases, the malicious agent must be identified, and brought to justice if the deceased’s spirit is ever to rest in peace.

Figure 4

It is of course, essential to the family‘s peace of mind as well, and the family is morally and ethically obliged to act on the deceased’s behalf. The ceremony is held in the courtyard of the family of the deceased.(Figure 3) In the ceremonies I attended, there were as many as a hundred people assembled. Many are women preparing food for the feast that will follow the consultation, and they continue to work on the periphery as the ceremony progresses. (Figure 4)

chief diviner

The consultation requires the participation of the chief diviner, and the other sanpu gbe in the community. However, sanpu and other diviners may be in attendance as well as observers. The ceremonies I observed began in the late morning, and lasted for about an hour. To begin, the elder sanpu gbe gather on a porch with their equipment.(Figure 5) The family stands nearby, looking on anxiously and providing assistance and the mandatory

Figure 5

sacrificial offerings of fowl, millet beer, water and foodstuffs. The diviners each bring a konkare, the stool-staff that marks their status as diviners, and seat themselves on them.(Figure 6) The consultation begins with the placement of several power objects (k’degue) on the ground in front of the diviner who conducts the ceremony. The power objects are tarry, black, horn-shaped objects with an animal tail protruding from one end. A

Figure 6

secret formulation of medicines are encased in the “horn” that give the diviner his power to divine.(Figure 7) He begins by invoking the spirits who will help him determining the cause of death, and also addresses

Figure 7

the spirit of the deceased.

In the course of the ceremony, the objects on the ground are manipulated and sacrifices are offered to activate them.(Figure 8) As in regular divination sessions, the diviner taps the horn on the edge of his stone tablet, and spills its contents of cowries, metal rings and idiosyncratic objects on it, then read the configuration. The process is repeated, until he determines a clear answer about the cause of

Figure 8

death has been revealed by the spirits. The diviner verifies his interpretation by sacrificing a chicken. If the chicken dies with its belly up, then the sacrifice has been accepted and the interpretation is considered to be correct. If it dies on its side or with its back up, it is a negative sign that calls for another reading and another sacrifice.

Figure 9

If the outcome is that the person died of good causes (has either been called to the afterlife by the guiding spirit, or simply passed away from an illness with no malice on the part of the spiritworld) then the family is elated and offers the diviners a pot of millet beer (dolo), which they pass around.(Figure 9) They offer the diviners dolo and corn as appreciation for their services. The feast may begin once the diviners have ritually consumed the dolo. The two interpretations I received from the readings were that the deceased had indeed been called to the world of their spirits from the water, and thus the families could rejoice.

The Small Diviners , Sanpu

Figure 10

The Sanpu diviners are distinguished by their small round chambers, and their technique of holding the client’s hand during a consultation.(Figure 10) In many respects, their practices are more open than the sanpu gbe. The altar areas of the sanpu are against a wall, and the diviner sits in the chamber facing the client so that their outstretched legs are parallel. During the consultation the diviner rings a bifurcated iron handgong, and shakes a gourd rattle to arouse the spirits, and queries them about the purpose of the client’s visit.(Figure 11)

Figure 11

The diviner then takes the hand of the client, and gently guides it up and down according to the answer provided by the spirits to an ongoing query by the diviner.(Figure 12) After several minutes, the diviner then releases the client’s hand, and throws a group of cowries on the floor between them. The configuration is interpreted as a sign of the spirits that suggests further information about the client’s problem, and a remedy such as a sacrifice. During the consultation, the diviner is assisted by the mediation of her tasie, who serve as temporary embodiments and mouthpieces for the spirits. They are the means through which the diviner’s personal spirits can communicate with the client’s personal spirits, or setan, to determine the source of a problem. The small wood figures vary in style, from highly abstract forms with no articulation to naturalistic forms with carefully

Figure 12

detailed features. The figures may be standing on small stones and clearly visible to the client, or the diviner may wrap them in cloth, and partially hide them in the back of the altar.(Figure 13)

Figure 13

Over time, they may be completely covered with encrustations of sacrificial substances (beer, water, blood, and saliva), added to activate and appease them. They may also be adorned with beads. Other implements in the diviner’s kit include the k’degue, a specially formulated power object made when she is initiated by the chief diviner, that contains a portion of the roots that she gathered during her intiation rites in the bush. The pots or sepine that contain her sacred roots, line the walls of her chamber, and a sepine with tisanes from medicinal plants may rest outside the chamber for clients.(Figure 14) Iron staffs with sharpened points on one end are insignia of the diviner and indicate her power to fight evil forces. Together these implements, gathered in the intimate space of the diviner’s room, are the visible and tangible signs of spiritual and invisible powers.

Figure 14

In my visit to Toussiana in 2006, I was able to revisit a diviner, Serge Ouattara whose mother, Yabil Traoré, had worked closely with me before. I consulted with Serge, and noticed that he had double the number of tasie and power objects on his altar. His mother had allowed him to take her objects and use them, although normally power objects would have been destroyed and tasie would be given to another diviner who could not afford to have them made, as they are quite expensive to commission. This and the fact that Serge carried his cell phone even in the divination chamber,(Figure 12) signaled his quest for greater spiritual power just as it indicated his desire for material and globalized connections.

Textiles in Divination

Figure 15

Diviners use a variety of handwoven textiles in consultations and for prescribed sacrifices. The cloth I saw in diviner’s chambers is made by local Dafing weavers but can also be acquired in the market, as the types used are widely produced in southwestern Burkina Faso and beyond. Some patterns, such as “Guinea fowl” are now factory made, or handwoven from factory spun thread. These types may be purchased in the great markets of Ouagadougou, proving it is far from a localized product 2. The most prevalent material used is cotton, but Dafing weavers in Toussiana also incorporate wild silk and kapok into their cloth.(Figure 15) In the past, they used only handspun thread brought to them by local people’s who commissioned special cloth. Now they make their own thread, or can buy factory made thread.

Figure 16

Divination interlocutor figures, or tasie, used by the small diviners are covered in cloth, usually with a dark blue and white pattern. The two most commonly seen patterns are stripes, which has many variations and names, and small checks or houndstooth, known as “Guinea fowl” or Kamifani (“Guinea fowl cloth”) in Jula, and vé fwo (“Guinea fowl cloth”) in Winwey.(Figure 16) The checked pattern mimicks the black and white speckled feathers of the guinea fowl. The male tasie is wrapped from the neck down but the female may either be wrapped from the waist down or from the neck down.(Figure 13 and 17) In some cases the male is wrapped in stripes and the female in “guinea fowl”.

Figure 17

The spirits are said to prefer the dark and light patterns in general, but are particularly fond of the guinea fowl pattern. It is spectacular and expensive, as is the dark speckled guinea fowl used for important sacrifices such as those for initiation. I was also told that spirits, like humans have individual preferences in color and pattern choices as everything else 3.

Figure 18

Kamifani is also recommended by diviners as a cloth to be worn by clients to appease spirits. Women clients are usually told to wear a kamifani wrapper (about 1 x 2 yards), and men are told to wear a white cotton strip woven tunic with a central strip of kamifani.(Figure 18) I was told by an elderly weaver in the village Soubakaniedougou, that the number of strips is significant, as it reveals a male and female reference through the numbers 3 and 4 respectively, and various combinations, such as 7, 11 and so forth. In 1999, a group of Dafing weavers in Toussiana, the Kini family, told me a similar story about the striped patterns in their cloth.

Figure 19

In 2006, I revisited the Kini family and commissioned them to make a woman’s wrapper of kamifani.(Figures 15 and 19) This cloth, now included in the exhibition in the Harn Museum, is an important example of an art medium that is less well-documented than wood or metal objects in the divination process, simply because it is rarely accepted as a permanent and significant art form by many western collectors. Unfortunately, this handmade cloth will likely disappear, as only a few people in the village areas are still willing to pay the weavers to produce it, and many versions of factory-made kamifani are now available at a much lower cost.

An Immigrant Diviner and Healer in Toussiana
The practices of divination and healing are often convergent practices, and some individuals are skilled in both. In 1998, I met Alexis Kambiré, an immigrant to Toussiana who had come from his Lobi village of Tindjera to practice both healing and divination. (Figure 20) By 1998, he had a thriving practice, with many clients coming to him for cures for a range of illnesses, or solutions to problems related to domestic life, travel and work. I had several consultations with Kambiré, but only after he accepted me and felt that he

Figure 20

could be sure his guiding spirits approved of my study. I suspected that one reason for his reluctance was his earlier interaction with a team of researchers from an American pharmaceutical company who had asked him for information about local botanical medicines. It may be that he considered this team to have exploited him and was wary of yet another American asking for his carefully guarded secrets. Kambiré said he had sold them cures for headaches and other remedies, although he professed to have cures for almost everything. This knowledge of herbal medicines was passed on to him by his father who was a renown diviner and healer, but it is also empowered by the spirit Tuolo. Through his American employers Kambiré is obviously well acquainted with Westerners, having adopted Western dress and tastes, and yet retains much of his own identity as a Lobi person. While such a position could result in self-marginalization, he has married a Win woman and has several children, and thus appears to be well assimilated into the community. However, I never saw him at any events for diviners, such as initiations or funerals or those for local spirits, such as Boro or Kuruba which are frequented by diviners, healers and many other local people. He is still very much tied to his home village where he must make pilgrimages yearly to retrieve sacred plants, water and other substances to renew his powers as a diviner.

Roots and Healing
Kambiré’s healing practice not only complements his divination, but is integral to finding cures for clients. Roots are essential medications, considered to be both bio-medically effective but spiritually efficacious. For this reason, one sees bundles of roots freshly harvested, before they are sent to a client in the divination chamber from time to time. But there are roots in pots and bundles that are never revealed. Concealed in these vessels and wrappings, they are working for the healer and his client. Kambiré’s account of finding roots characterizes them as not only life giving but alive and actively responsive to those who have deep knowledge of them. In this sense, roots actually become symbols of a diviner’s knowledge, of a healer’s power. Kept hidden in his chamber, they act as batteries, regenerating power when needed. When their power is exhausted they have to be replenished, and he is forced to find them in his homeland, the original source of his power and wisdom. In digging up the roots of his homeland, earth , wisdom, healing, divination and identity are thus clearly and closely linked. His description of the search is as follows:

When you search for roots at night it is the genies [nature spirits] who guide you. They are the ones who do this. You kill a chicken under a tree and then return and the roots are there and the chicken is gone; you merely gather them and leave. Roots speak under the tree, One can cure 10 illnesses from one tree. You have to listen to the roots speak - which is really the genies who tell you which root growing in which direction can cure something. After your incantation you listen to what the genies say, that you must search the east ,west, north or south to find the one that provides the cure you need.[ In order to find it you have to say]" I want to find the cure for..." If you cut the wrong root it's like killing someone.[ I ask for an explanation of the orientation]... it may change according to each time you approach the same tree; only the genies can tell you. You invoke the genies of the bush and the king of the trees. You must replace the earth if you do not you cannot re-enter your house. You might approach it but you are barred from going inside. Only after the invocation can you get the root you need. Real healers only know that you must replace the earth- the ones [false healers] who work in the market selling leaves no not replace the earth properly 4.

Kambiré thus has a complex and diverse identity as a healer that was beneficial to him. Although further comparative study is needed it appears that his techniques and implements are similar in some ways to two other Lobi diviners I visited in Tindjera. However, these diviners’ practices varied, as one was a female diviner who was guided by an ancestral spirit who possessed her, and the other was a male diviner who was guided by spirit beings from the bush. Kambiré's guiding spirit was Lewa, a female bush spirit and his paraphernalia and techniques were fairly close to those of the male diviner. He employed a vast array of objects in his divinatory consultations, including clay sculptures of spirit beings, magical gourds dedicated to each spirit, sugi, or power objects with secret ingredients packed around an animal tail (similar to the k’degue of sanpu diviners) , a notebook filled with illegible “script”, Muslim prayer beads, animal pelts and skulls and vessels containing roots, water and other medicinal substances. The floor of his rectangular chamber was covered with fragments of objects collected over a long time, and seemed to form a museum for his personal history. I saw a color print of a political map of Africa, a blue glass bottle, a pair of scissors. These objects were assembled as an altar, and encrusted with sacrificial offerings, including beer, water, blood, and feathers.

Figure 21

(Figure21) The effect of the assemblage of this dizzying array of objects and materials, some hidden some exposed, was overwhelming. This sensorially opulent arrangement, designed to pull the mind to another cognitive plane, through a hyperaesthetic space, I have labeled an “aesthetiscape.” The aesthetiscape is a perfect strategy for engaging the senses and derailing rational, linear thinking in favor of more inclusive cognitive process. Textures, colors, shapes, odors, and sounds, all contribute to the desired effect of forcing new thinking and hence new solutions to old problems.

Kambiré has a large clientele made up predominantly of people from Toussiana. He claims that one reason he moved away from Tindjera was the competitiveness of diviners. He explained that there are so many diviners in his home village compared to Toussiana and he felt he had more opportunity to make a living with his practice by moving there. He had lived in several other villages in Burkina Faso. He also noted that his clients are from diverse backgrounds. In order to accommodate those with religious or other affiliations that may conflict with beliefs associated with his practices, he changed his location. He once had a divination house adjacent to the market, but he has since moved in order to allow his clients to see him more discretely.

Figure 22

(Figure 22) Indeed, his house is now at the edge of a large field far to the west of the market perimeter. It is also convenient for having visitors on market day, which is normally the busiest day for local diviners, and thus, he seems to have found an ideal location. His relocation was but one mark of his business savy, a key feature he shared with other diviners.

I was thrilled to see that Kambiré was still in the same location when I returned in 2006, and still had a thriving practice. As I waited for his return to his chamber one day, several clients appeared in rapid succession. One woman was seeking advice about a business venture. Another had been treated for a gastric disorder. Both were repeat clients who were happy with their treatments and praised Kambiré’s skills as a diviner and healer. When consulting with Kambiré, and observing the consultations of colleagues, I was once again impressed by the complexity of his process of divination and of the treatments he recommended.

A Consultation with Kambiré
[This account of my research assistant, Madeleine Traoré’s consultation with Kambiré occurred in 1999. It is one of the only consultations I was allowed to videotape, although I witnessed and participated in others. The divination session lasted about 15 minutes. I included segments from this video in my exhibition, African Arts of Healing and Divination.]

Kambiré began the consultation seated on his wooden stool in front of his altar. Madeleine was to his right facing him but several feet away. He sat quietly facing the altar then spoke in Lobiri to the spirits. He raised the gourd on the string to the top, then it descended. He looked bemused, placed his hand on his head, then meditated silently a moment. He then opened a large gourd bowl with a lid coated in feathers and sacrificial accretions, then quickly replaced the lid. He removed a large sugi beside it and held it in his left hand, then opened another small gourd and peered inside it for a moment. He then placed the large sugi beside the gourds. He took two small sugi and placed them on the ground. One sugi studded with cowries remained next to the figure of wathil. He placed a metal bracelet on the ground near his feet and placed a gourd bowl over it, then slid the gourd to his right and stood on it with one foot. He stood thus, one foot on the gourd and one on the ground, leaning against the wall, facing down at his altar. He sat again, with his right foot still on the gourd, and made gestures on the ground. He spoke to the gourd on the string and then raised it again, and it came down sporadically, as he addressed questions to it. He then held it in his hands and spoke to it further, then replaced it in its normal position next to the gourds on the altar. He explained the thil’s response to Madeleine, and said the spirits required a sacrifice. He enumerated the items she had to offer and the context, time and place, of the offering, and elaborated on the type of objects needed, the type of kola nuts, for example. He then picked up the notebook from the ground by his right foot and began to peruse it, speaking intermittently to Madeleine. He held the book in his hand for some time as he spoke to her, continuing to explain the nature of the sacrifice and listen to her response. He remained seated, book in hand and foot on the gourd for some minutes, then the session was finished.

Visual Culture and Health in Ghana

Figure 23

My experience with diviners and healers in Toussiana and throughout southern Burkina Faso was contrasted with an experience of how healing practices and ideas intersect with contemporary visual culture in Ghana. My limited time in Ghana was spent primarily in urban areas where sign painting is a well-cultivated art form which encompasses a range of styles and

Figure 24

skill levels. In recent years, European and American art historians, curators and gallerists have recognized the talents of sign painters, featuring them in exhibitions and publications. One of the most acclaimed is a painter in Kumasi, Kwame Akoto. Akoto is the founder of the Almighty God Artworks, a workshop on a main thoroughfare in the urban center.(Figure 23) The workshop is impressive, with a large fenced in workspace taking up about a half of a city block. The 15 foot high fencing is covered with paintings, on canvases and boards, mainly executed with housepaint.(Figure 24) They range from photorealist portraits of Asante chiefs to abstract expressionist assemblages. Some are works of the master himself, whereas others are by his apprentices.(Figure 25) Works are rarely signed and yet there are identifiable hands, as a comparison of works on identical themes reveals. Recurrent themes that seem to attract

Figure 25

Akoto, and his assistants, more than others, are those of social and physiological disorders. Many of his works propose remedies, others admonish those responsible for the affliction. Among the most striking were those warning against smoking, drunk driving, and negligent parents.

Figure 26

A particularly effective and expressive image was a clear reminder of the tragedy of AIDS, designed in response to an awareness campaign launched by the Ghanaian government in 2002.(Figure 26) The slogan of the campaign, “Stop AIDS, Love Life” is inscribed on the left of the canvas, with “AIDS is a Killer” running across the bottom. The central panel bears the image of a seated couple, partially clothed to expose their emaciated bodies. Their stark forms contrast with the lush greenery of the forest foliage in the background. Compelled by this image, and seeing that it was reproduced a number of times in the workshop by different hands, I commissioned Akoto to paint yet another one for my exhibition, specifying only the size and similarity to a certain example in the front of the workshop facing the street. The painting was delivered after several months. While the painting faithfully reproduces the prototype, it exaggerates the emaciated limbs and features of the couple, adding frightening photorealist detail. Another painting I commissioned of a healer’s sign, illustrating various maladies, is entirely the work of a photorealist. Although such signs may exist in Ghana, they are generally much more schematic. Both works serve to inform and educate about health and social responsibility for the public, and bridge a gap between a world with “traditional’ medicines and well-known diseases to the contemporary world, riddled with massive pandemics.

List of Figures
1 Map of Burkina Faso
2 Interior of a a chief sanwo gbe’s divination house, showing one of two doorways. The sounding stone where the divination is conducted is in the center, and the two stools on either side are for the diviner and his client. Feathers on the floor are from many sacrifices of fowl. Toussiana, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 1999.
3 A gathering in the courtyard of the deceased, of family and friends who will witness the consultation with the great diviners (sanpu gbe) to determine the cause of death. Yerokofesso, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006.
4 Finely dressed women and children waiting for the funerary divination consultation of a sanwo gbe in the courtyard of the deceased. Yerokofesso, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006
5 A sanwo gbe begins the consultation to determine cause of death, by sounding his iron handgong and chanting as he speaks to the spirits. The sounding stone rests on a basket. A relative of the deceased observes the consultation. Yerokofesso, Burkina Faso.Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006.
6 Sanpu Gbe diviners holding their staffs (konkarke) that also serve as canes and stools. They are convening by the home of the deceased before a funerary consultation. The two men on the left are chief diviners. Yerokofesso, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006
7 A sanwo gbe begins the consultation to determine cause of death, by tapping his sounding stone with a horn. The horn serves as a container for the cowries and other materials that are read after they are spilled onto the stone surface. The sounding stone rests on a basket, serving as a makeshift, portable pedestal. Yerokofesso, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006.
8 The chief sawo gbe diviner offers a green leaf favored by the spirits to activate the k’degue or power object. Yerokofesso, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006
9 Relatives of the deceased offering millet beer (dolo) to the sanpu gbe after the funerary consultation. Yerokofesso, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006.
10 A client waits outside the chamber of a sanpu diviner. Clients must remove their shoes before entering the chamber through the small doorway. Toussiana, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Celestin Coulibaly, 2003.
11 A sanpu diviner, Yabil Traoré, plays an iron hand-gong, gourd rattle and chants during a consultation to invoke and query the spirits. Toussiana, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Celestin Coulibaly, 2002.
12 A divination consultation with the sanpu diviner and healer, Serge Ouattara, demonstrating the handholding technique of the sanpu or gbintalesanpu diviners. Toussiana , Burkina Faso Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006
13 A sanpu altar with tasie figures, ceramic pots, iron staffs, and sacrificial substances. Toussiana, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 1999.
14 A ceramic pot outside of a diviner’s house used as an altar for a guiding spirit. The forked branch is part of the altar, which has residue from sacrifices of fowl and other substances.
15 Pagieni Karim Kini and Fatimata Konate, a Dafing couple with a sample of cloth they produce from cotton, kapok, wild silk and indigo. Dakaria, Toussiana, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006.
16 Woven strip of guinea fowl cloth, or kamifani. Photograph by John Knaub, 2004.
17 A pair of interlocutor figures wrapped with guinea fowl cloth (kamifani) on a diviner’s altar in an area south of Toussiana. Soubakaniedougou, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 1997.
18 A sanwo’s client wearing a guinea fowl cloth, or kamifani, wrapper over her skirt. She is waiting in the courtyard of diviner Yabil Traoré. Toussiana, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 1998.
She is waiting in the courtyard of sanwo, Yabil Traoré. Toussiana, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 1998.
19 Sumana Kini, a Dafing weaver working on a horizontal loom. Dakaria, Toussiana, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006
20 Alexis Kambiré, a Lobi diviner and healer, consulting his notebook as part of the interpretation of a spirit message during a consultation. He sits in front of his altar and the client is seated in the foreground. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006
21 Close up of Alexis Kambiré’s altar, with roots, gourds, sugi, thil figures, ceramic vessels, glass bottles, animal skulls and pelts, prayer beads, feathers and other sacrificial encrustations.
22 Alexis Kambiré’s divination chamber (right), and his home (left).Yerokofesso, Burkina Faso. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 1998.
23 Kwame Akoto, founder of the Almighty God Artworks, painting workshop in Kumasi,Ghana. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006
24 The front fence of the Almighty God Artworks painting workshop in Kumasi, Ghana.
25 A photorealist painting of the Asantehene, next to abstract works that are hanging on outer wall of Almighty God Artworks, Kumasi, Ghana. Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006.
26 Painting on the wall of the Almighty God Artworks with slogans, “Stop Aids Love Life and “Aids is a Killer.”
Photograph by Susan Cooksey, 2006.

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