Surface is evidence
On an Ere Ibeji, deposits are not automatically dirt. Palm oil, pigments, repeated washing, handling, cloth, beads and contact with the body can build a ritual history. Even ordinary dust can reveal which areas were protected or exposed.
Cleaning is irreversible; begin by deciding what the surface may be telling you.
Look under neutral light
Use soft daylight and a magnifier. Photograph loose material, insect holes, cracks, glossy ridges and matte recesses. Smell nothing closely and apply no solvent. If active infestation, unstable pigment or lifting material is suspected, isolate the piece and consult a conservator familiar with African wooden sculpture.
Minimal action, maximum record
A soft dry brush may be appropriate only when loose household dust is clearly distinguishable from older deposits. Avoid water, alcohol, furniture products, oils and commercial waxes. Conservation aims to stabilise an object; it should not make it look newly polished.
A wider reading
Documentation should accompany the visual argument. Record the observation behind minimal action, maximum record, photograph it under neutral light and note the date of the assessment. A soft dry brush may be appropriate only when loose household dust is clearly distinguishable from older deposits. If the interpretation comes from a publication or another specialist, retain the exact reference and wording. Such discipline does not make collecting bureaucratic; it preserves the difference between what the object shows, what someone remembers and what a later observer has proposed.
Uncertainty is not an empty conclusion. In the context of Before You Clean an Old Ibeji, it can identify the exact point at which evidence becomes insufficient. Use soft daylight and a magnifier. Saying ‘possibly,’ ‘related to’ or ‘attributed to the region of’ may describe the state of knowledge more accurately than a confident workshop name. Precision lies in matching the strength of the language to the strength of the evidence, not in producing the narrowest label available.
For the collector, the consequence is concrete. Before allowing look under neutral light to influence price or desire, write down the strongest argument against the preferred interpretation. On an Ere Ibeji, deposits are not automatically dirt. Then decide whether the object would still matter if its most prestigious label disappeared. A figure that remains compelling after that test possesses an independence that a fashionable attribution cannot manufacture.
From observation to judgment
The broader lesson is methodological rather than categorical. A soft dry brush may be appropriate only when loose household dust is clearly distinguishable from older deposits. No isolated rule can replace accumulated looking, and accumulated looking is useful only when examples are compared critically. Because any intervention changes the evidence, restraint and precise documentation are part of responsible ownership. The aim is not to remove intuition, but to make intuition answerable to evidence. With time, this produces judgments that are both firmer and easier to revise.
One final distinction deserves emphasis. Description answers what is present; interpretation asks what it may mean; evaluation considers how well the sculpture succeeds. Use soft daylight and a magnifier. These operations often occur at once, yet separating them for a moment reveals hidden assumptions. It becomes possible to admire a figure without exaggerating its age, to value its history without overstating its rarity, and to discuss an attribution without pretending that it is proven.
Seen within the complete life of the object, look under neutral light is therefore neither a minor detail nor a self-sufficient answer. On an Ere Ibeji, deposits are not automatically dirt. Its importance depends on relationships: to the remaining anatomy, to patterns of handling, to workshop practice and to the evidence preserved in records. Reading those relationships patiently is what turns recognition into research and possession into informed stewardship.