Mr. Zuss: Mask?
Nickles: Mask. Naturally. You wouldn’t play God in your face, would you?
—Archibald MacLeish, J.B. (1958)
We cannot be exposed to the looks of others, for our very being is night-lustrous and unseeable. Like the Invisible Man, we are only revealed through our clothes and our masks.
—D.H. Lawrence, Aaron’s Rod (1922)
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
—Oscar Wilde, The Critic as Artist (1891)
Everyone who is profound loves the mask.
—Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil (1886)
A mask is not primarily what it represents but what it transforms . . . . Like a myth, a mask denies as much as it affirms.
—Claude Lévi-Strauss, The Way of the Masks (1975)
Life is but a mask worn on the face of death. And is death, then, but another mask?
—Joseph Campbell, The Mythic Image (1981)
Richard Sionis: A mask hides the face but frees the soul. A mask speaks the truth.
—Gotham, Season 1, Episode 8 (Fox Broadcasting Co.)
For me, the masks were not just sculptures . . . . They were magical objects . . . intercessors . . . against unknown, threatening spirits.
—Pablo Picasso
There are currently 589 masks in the museum.
Click on any region to see its cultural masks.
