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Ogoni Mami Wata

TITLE: Ogoni Mami Wata Mask
TYPE: face mask
GENERAL REGION: Africa
COUNTRY: Nigeria
ETHNICITY: Ogoni
DESCRIPTION: Ogoni Mami Wata face mask
CATALOG ID: AFNG002
MAKER: Unknown
CEREMONY: Agriculture; Funeral
AGE: 1970s
MAIN MATERIAL: wood
OTHER MATERIALS: paint

The Ogoni people have managed to maintain much of their precolonial culture, including their masquerading traditions.

Masks are used for funeral celebrations and to celebrate the harvesting of yams.  The Mami Wata represented here is a water goddess important to many northwest African cultures. She is sometimes represented by a mermaid but is nearly always surrounded by snakes, as here.

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Nafana Bedu Mask

TITLE: Nafana Bedu Mask
TYPE: plank mask
GENERAL REGION: Africa
COUNTRY: Côte d’Ivoire
ETHNICITY: Nafana
DESCRIPTION: Bedu Association Male Plank Mask
CATALOG ID: AFCI022
MAKER: Unknown
CEREMONY: Secret Society; Purification; Celebration; Funereal; Agriculture
AGE: early 2000s
MAIN MATERIAL: wood
OTHER MATERIALS: kaolin; pigment

The Nafana people of Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana have developed a Bedu Secret Society only in the last century. It is probably a successor to the Sakrobundi Secret Society banned by the British due to the Society’s function of violently punishing supposed sorcerers.  The Bedu society is charged with the less malignant function of village purification during a month-long new year’s celebration annually, as well as during harvest festivals and funerals.  The bedu itself represents a mythical ox-like beast that, in Nafana myth, cured a sick child and later disappeared into the bush.  Although these masks are worn over the face, their exceptional size requires them to be made of relatively light wood.

Bedu masks come in both genders, with the male masks (such as this one) having horns, and the female having a circle or disc on top. Most such masks of either gender are painted in kaolin clay with abstract geometrical patterns, checker marks and jagged fins being favored.  Sometimes red, blue, or black pigments are used as well.

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Dayak Demon Mask

TITLE: Dayak Demon Mask
TYPE: face mask
GENERAL REGION: Oceania
COUNTRY: Indonesia
SUBREGION: Borneo
ETHNICITY: Dayak
DESCRIPTION: Dayak Demon Bukong
CATALOG ID: OCID003
MAKER: Unknown
CEREMONY: Unknown
FUNCTION: Agriculture; Purification
AGE: 1880s
MAIN MATERIAL: wood
OTHER MATERIALS: pigment

Not much is known about the masked ceremonies of the South Kalimantan region of Borneo. This mask dates to the late 19th century and represents a demon.  Stylistically, it shows traces of Hindu influence from Javanese settlers, transmitted to the settlers from Indian traders in previous centuries.  Such masks were most probably used to drive away evil spirits from the village during important ceremonies, such as funerals, and from crop fields.

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Cherokee Bison Mask

TITLE: Cherokee Bison Mask
TYPE: face mask
GENERAL REGION: North America
COUNTRY: United States of America
SUBREGION: North Carolina
ETHNICITY: Cherokee
DESCRIPTION: Booger mask in the form of a bison
CATALOG ID: NAUS081
MAKER: Allen Long (Cherokee, North Carolina, 1917-1983)
CEREMONY: Booger Dance
AGE: ca. 1970s
MAIN MATERIAL: wood
OTHER MATERIALS: pigment

In the Eastern Cherokee Nation, the booger (tsu’nigadu’li) dance forms an important part of the winter celebration to discourage evil spirits from disrupting the coming growing season. The boogers themselves represent the evil spirits, and they traditionally portrayed grotesque faces seeking to fight, chase women, and create general havoc. Following colonization, the booger dancers focused their misdeeds especially on satirizing the insolence, foolishness, and lust of European colonists toward the Cherokee women.

Booger masks could be made of wood, gourds, or carved wasp nests.  This specific mask was made by a famed carver, Allen Long.

For more on Cherokee masked dance, see Frank G. Speck & Leonard Broom, Cherokee Dance and Drama (University of Oklahoma Press 1951).

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