Create an object file
Record measurements, material, condition, acquisition source, date, price, previous owners, exhibitions and publications. Save invoices, correspondence and the seller’s original description without silently correcting it.
A sculpture without records loses part of its future meaning.
Separate evidence from interpretation
Mark attributions and dates as opinions, noting who proposed them and when. Add comparison images with full references. This allows later researchers to see how a conclusion developed rather than inherit it as fact.
Make continuity possible
Back up photographs and documents in more than one place and use a stable inventory number. Documentation protects value, but more importantly it protects knowledge from being detached from the object.
A wider reading
The central issue in Do Not Merely Own It. Document It becomes clearer when we slow the sequence of judgment. Record measurements, material, condition, acquisition source, date, price, previous owners, exhibitions and publications. This is not a decorative distinction. It changes what can legitimately be inferred from the object and what must remain provisional. A useful record distinguishes observation, testimony and interpretation so that later researchers can retrace the argument. A conclusion becomes persuasive only when the visible evidence, the object’s documented history and the proposed cultural context reinforce rather than merely echo one another.
A useful way to test this point is to begin with separate evidence from interpretation and temporarily ignore the sales description. Back up photographs and documents in more than one place and use a stable inventory number. Now ask which parts of that statement are directly observable, which depend on comparison, and which rely on testimony. This three-part division prevents an attractive story from hardening into fact. It also makes later revision possible when a better comparison, an older photograph or new provenance information becomes available.
From observation to judgment
In practical study, the object should be approached from more than one distance. From across the room, assess balance and presence; at arm’s length, follow the organisation of the volumes; under close light, examine tool work, transitions, wear and additions. The point made here—mark attributions and dates as opinions, noting who proposed them and when.—must remain convincing at all three distances. If it survives only in a close-up or only in an overall impression, the interpretation needs further testing.
Comparison is most reliable when it is controlled. Place the figure beside securely documented examples photographed from the same angle and at a similar scale. Compare one system at a time: head and face, then torso and limbs, then base and surface. Record measurements, material, condition, acquisition source, date, price, previous owners, exhibitions and publications. Similarity in one striking element may be accidental or widely shared; repeated agreement across independent areas is more significant. Contradictions should be recorded rather than explained away.
The history of an Ere Ibeji rarely follows a single clean line. Commission, ritual use, repair, inheritance, sale, collection and publication can each alter the object or the language attached to it. Back up photographs and documents in more than one place and use a stable inventory number. For that reason, an apparently simple description may contain several dates and several kinds of authorship. The carver made the form, but families, ritual specialists, traders, dealers, collectors and restorers may all have shaped what is now seen.