Anthropomorphic face mask "gu" · Côte d'Ivoire, Guro · ID: 3032633
Sotheby Parke Bernet, New York, 9 th November 1979, lot 26
Richard Rüegg, Zurich, Switzerland
Description
heavy wood, dark brown patina, whitened teeth, small remains of red paint on the lips, typical narrow face with protruding mouth part and delicate nose bridge, raised scarification marks, filed incisors, fine grooved coiffure with long lobes at the temples, slightly dam., crack;
“gu” is always presented as a young woman, who is considered to be zambles wife. During the masquerade she appears after the two zoomorphic masks “zaule” and “zamble”, accompanied by flutes, moving slowly and charming, singing in honour of “zamble”. The mask ensemble appears at funeral ceremonies and on various festivities, they are assigned to resolve disputes and to search for witches.
The object Anthropomorphic face mask “gu” with the object ID 3032633 was last part of the auction 69th tribal art auction at June 2, 2012 on Zemanek-Münster Auction house. The object with the lot number 186 achieved a sales price of EUR 3,000.
You can find more Masks and other popular object types on our related topic pages. You may also be interested in our page on African art.
Comparing literature
Fischer, Eberhard, Guro, Masks, München, Berlin, London, New York 2008, p. 368