Luba-Hemba Female figure with a cup

One of the most known subjects in Luba art is the carved kneeling or sitting female figures who usually holding cups.These figures are the most important instrument, when Diviners addressing crises and conflicts threatening individual, or communal well-being. During their rites appeasing the angry ancestors inflicting the misfortune, they honor the wives of their possessing spirits, and reinforcing the Luba notion of women as spirit containers in both lives: this and the life beyond. (Roberts, 1993:74).  The figure also set up before the hut of a pregnant woman, or after a birth to receive the offering of passers-by and evoke the image of a female ancestor.  Not surprisingly, the figure with a bowl is associated with fertility, birth, the new moon and blood ascendance. (R. Wassing 1994:205).