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Kuba Bwoom

TITLE: Kuba Bwoom
TYPE: crest mask
GENERAL REGION: Africa
COUNTRY: Democratic Republic of Congo
ETHNICITY: Kuba
DESCRIPTION: Bwoom Crest Mask
CATALOG ID: AFCD007
MAKER: Unknown
CEREMONY: Entertainment; Funeral; Status
AGE: 1990s
MAIN MATERIAL: wood
OTHER MATERIALS: copper sheet; cloth; cowrie shells; beads; plant fiber

The Kuba people inhabit the area south of the Kasai River.  Although the Kuba have some two dozen mask types, those still in use today are mostly the three royal masks, whose use is reserved to those given permission by the quasi-divine king (nyimi). These are danced mainly as a form of entertainment reinforcing the status of the royalty and at chiefly funerals.  The adult initiation (mukanda) masks are now rarely used in Kuba society.

What the bwoom mask represents varies among Kuba storytellers. Some refer to it as a younger brother of the king, while others represent it as an outsider or commoner. The copper sheeting is a spiritual substance among many African peoples, and among some represents status or royalty. However, in Kuba society, only gilded metal is reserved for the nyimi.  As a force opposing the other two royal masks, bwoom must be content with copper.  The bwoom dance, unlike other royal dances, is energetic and exuberant.

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Dan Kran Gla

TITLE: Kran Gla Mask
TYPE: face mask
GENERAL REGION: Africa
COUNTRY: Côte d’Ivoire
ETHNICITY: Kran (Dan)
DESCRIPTION: Gla Society spider mask
CATALOG ID: AFCI025
MAKER: Unknown
CEREMONY: Agriculture; Funeral Secret Society; Social Control
AGE: ca. 2000
MAIN MATERIAL: wood
OTHER MATERIALS: metal tacks; kaolin clay

The Kran ethnic subgroup of the Dan people, and are also known as the We or Guere, living primarily in the Côte d’Ivoire.  The Gla secret society of the Kran people are charged with maintaining social control, including judicial functions, as well as officiating at harvest ceremonies and funerals.  They use “male” masks such as these to confer authority on the wearer in the performance of his important community functions.

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Guro Gu Mask

TITLE: Guro Gu Mask
TYPE: face mask
GENERAL REGION: Africa
COUNTRY: Côte d’Ivoire
ETHNICITY: Guro
DESCRIPTION: Gu Mask
CATALOG ID: AFCI005
MAKER: Unknown
CEREMONY: Celebration; Entertainment; Funeral
AGE: ca. 2010
MAIN MATERIAL: wood
OTHER MATERIALS: oil-based paint

The Guro gu mask represents a beautiful young woman. It forms part of the trio of sacred masks with the zamble and zaouli. In the past, gu was the wife of zamble, but in modern rituals she is represented as the wife of zaouli, and therefore zamble‘s mother. All three masks are cult objects to which sacrifices are periodically made to bring prosperity to the family that owns them and to drive away evil spirits.  They are danced for celebrations and as entertainment, and also at funerals and to honor ancestors. The gu represents a divinity, but her dance careens about, stamping her feet incessantly. She wears bells on her ankles to accentuate her foot movements and dances to the music of a few flutes.

This mask was made for the tourist trade, but it displays the exceptional skill and artistry typical of guro master carvers. The elaborate hair style is an important element of the gu‘s appeal.

For more on Guro masking traditions, see Eberhard Fischer, Guro (Prestel, 2008) or Anne-Marie Bouttiaux, Guro (5 Continents Editions, 2016).

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Baining Asaraigi Mask

TITLE: Baining Asaraigi Mask
TYPE: helmet mask
GENERAL REGION: Oceania
COUNTRY: Papua New Guinea
SUBREGION: East New Britain Islands
ETHNICITY: Melanesian (Baining)
DESCRIPTION: Uramot Asaraigi Mask
CATALOG ID: OCPG006
MAKER: Unknown
CEREMONY: Day Dance
FUNCTION: Adult Initiation; Agriculture; Celebration; Funeral; Spirit Invocation
AGE: ca. 1960s-1970s
MAIN MATERIAL: tapa cloth
OTHER MATERIALS: bamboo, vines; pigment from chewed roots and coconut husk ash

The Baining people live in eastern New Britain Island area known as the Gazelle Peninsula, in a mountainous tropical forest.  They are a Melanesian people closely akin to other groups in Papua New Guinea.  They traditionally live in small villages with dispersed political authority.  The Baining use their masks to unify the otherwise dispersed villagers, usually in celebrations of major events such as yam harvest, births, deaths, or adult initiation for both boys and girls.  Some dances are for the day time, mostly those centered around female tasks such as sowing, harvesting, and births.  Night dances center around male activities such as hunting.

The masks are mostly made of mulberry or breadfruit tree bark mashed and pounded into a cloth (“tapa cloth”) over bamboo frames.  Unlike most masking cultures, they make these masks specifically to be burned or discarded after the ceremony.  This specific mask, the asairigi, is used in day dances by the Uramot group of Baining people.  The black triangles represent tears of the spirit represented by the mask.  Day dance masks are made cooperatively by both men and women.

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Haida Dogfish

TITLE: Haida Dogfish
TYPE: face mask
GENERAL REGION: North America
COUNTRY: Canada
SUBREGION: British Columbia
ETHNICITY: Haida
DESCRIPTION: Dogfish Mask
CATALOG ID: NACA003
MAKER: Dalbert A. Weir (Masset, Queen Charlotte Islands, 1941- )
CEREMONY: Potlatch
AGE: 2007
MAIN MATERIAL: cedar wood
OTHER MATERIALS: paint

A potlatch is a culturally important ceremony among the coastal indigenous Americans of British Columbia, held on many different occasions.  It could be held to celebrate a family member’s change in social status, such as a marriage, birth, death, or initiation into adulthood.  It could also be held to restore a person’s prestige after a loss in dignity, such as falling out of a canoe or making a hunting error.  The ceremony could last for one day or as long as three weeks, depending on the occasion and the wealth of the giver.

A potlatch typically included three important components: a feast, entertainment, and gift giving to the guests.  The entertainment consisted of singing and masked dancing.  The more lavish the gifts, feast, and entertainment, the greater the prestige gained by the giver.  Because masks and costumes were expensive and time-consuming to make, larger and more elaborate masks raised the prestige of the potlatch giver.  The masks themselves represented totemic animals such as the killer whale, raven, beaver, or shark, or else mythical figures and beasts, such as the Komokwa, Dzunukwa or Bukwus. This mask represents the dogfish, a small relative of the shark that is an important totem for the Haida people.  The Haida believe that they had a female ancestor who could transform herself into a dogfish to experience the undersea world.

For more on masks of the coastal peoples of western Canada, see Peter MacNair, Robert Joseph & Bruce Grenville, Down from the Shimmering Sky: Masks of the Northwest Coast (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre Ltd., 1998) and Edward Malin, A World of Faces: Masks of the Northwest Coast Indians (Portland: Timber Press, 1978).

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Dogon Satimbe Mask

TITLE: Dogon Satimbe Mask
TYPE: face mask
GENERAL REGION: Africa
COUNTRY: Mali
ETHNICITY: Dogon
DESCRIPTION: Satimbe mask
CATALOG ID: AFML005
MAKER: Unknown
CEREMONY: Dama
FUNCTION: Funeral
AGE: 1940s
MAIN MATERIAL: ebony wood
OTHER MATERIALS: paint; glass beads; cowrie shells; hair; cotton string; 1919 British West Africa penny; bronze bell

The Dogon people of Mali use a tremendous variety of masks, most of which center around funeral rites. Traditionally, the Awa Society controlled the use of masks. This mask represents Yayemme, the first woman to discover the mystical use of masks, and Yasigi, a female character from Dogon creation myths who served beer at the first Dogon sigi celebration.  It is used in funerals to usher the spirit of the dead from the village back to its proper place in the bush.

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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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Teke Kidumu Mask

TITLE: Teke Kidumu Mask
TYPE: plank mask
GENERAL REGION: Africa
COUNTRY: Democratic Republic of Congo
ETHNICITY: Teke
DESCRIPTION: Teke Kidumu Society plank mask
CATALOG ID: AFCD021
MAKER: Unknown
CEREMONY: Adult Initiation; Funeral; Secret Society
AGE: 2000-2005
MAIN MATERIAL: wood
OTHER MATERIALS: kaolin; pigment

The Teke people of the Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly Zaire) established a kingdom in the 8th century on the Zaire River, ruled by a monarch whose authority is primarily spiritual. Political power is exercised by a structure of regional and village clan chiefs. Chiefs and priests, always men, belong to Mungala Society.

The Kidumu Secret Society, composed solely of adult men, plays a central role in adult initiation rituals, funerals and other major village events.  In the northwest region of their territory, a dancer from the Kidumu Society wears an abstract plank mask of the kind shown here, with a costume of raffia fiber and feathers to hide the body. The mask is associated with a bush spirit known as “Nkita.” Representing the spirit, the masquerader enters the village from the forest and dances an energetic cartwheeling dance alone to music rather than in a group before retiring again to the forest.

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