Lost Wax Joy Sculpture

Bring a millennia‒old crafting technique into your home with the Lost Wax Joy Statue. This statue of a dancer in an arched arabesque, wearing blue colored skirts was created by skilled artisans in Burkina Faso. This piece of fair trade African art was sculpted first in wax, then covered in clay. When the clay hardened, molten recycled bronze was poured into the clay mold, melting the wax, and hardening inside. Lastly, the hardened clay was shattered, revealing this one‒of‒a‒kind art piece for your collection.

Who Made It: Atelier de Bronze Bonkoungou et Frère specializes in the traditional technique of lost wax bronze casting. The workshop leader, Issouf Bonkoungou learned the ancient technique from his father and from a retired master artisan by the name of Sissao Hamidou whom Ten Thousand Villages began purchasing from in 1996. Mr. Hamidou was instrumental in the formation of the first artisan enterprise for bronze casting in the area, Antelier de Formation et de Promotion des Artisans in 2013 with aid from MCC Burkina Faso, a relief, development and peace agency of the North American Mennonite and Brethren in Christ. He continued training artisans in the craft and selling lost wax statues to Ten Thousand Villages until his retirement in 2021 when he passed the secure buying relationship on to Mr. Bonkoungou and Atelier de Bronze Bonkoungou. Ten Thousand Villages is the only advanced payment, bulk order buyer for Mr. Bonkoungou’s family and dozen other craftspeople working with him—fair trade has made a living wage possible in this marginalized area for more than two decades. 

Material: Bronze

Dimensions: 9”

Handcrafted in Burkina Faso