framed 83x112.5 cm - floating framed, museum glass
colored pencil and oil pastel on paper

About the creation
The Nkisi is a power figure used throughout the Congo Basin in Central Africa. Early travelers saw these as "fetishes" and "idols" but I prefer modern anthropology’s term "power objects" or "charms." They could be human or animal figures that are easily identified by a collection of pegs, blades, nails, or other sharp objects stuck into its surface. Some figures contain a medicinal aspect in the head or more commonly the belly in which herbs or other secrets were sometimes stored. I suffer from relentless migraines. It is genetic, nothing will cure it. Nonetheless, I decided to draw my own power objects. I ‘will’ my drawings into power objects. I crowd the images with patter, mark, texture, and colour reflecting the malignant hope for migraine relief, the healthy return of a body that has once abandoned me - Marlise Keith