Male leader mask "kam" ("akam", "nkam", "nkang") · Cameroon Grassfields, Kom · ID: 3049736
Georges Frederick Keller (1899-1981),Davos, Switzerland / Paris, France
Paolo Morigi (1939-2017), Magliaso-Lugano, Switzerland
Bernard Dulon, Paris, France
Adrian Schlag, Brüssel, Belgium
Description
wood, blackish mass, real hair, handwritten collection no. “G.F.K.222”, base
Very beautiful masked face with thickly encrusted remnants of a magical
mass with which “kam” was once charged. Hairstyle, beard and the long
braid are made of human hair.
The masks are worn flat on the head of the dancer, who always has to bend forward, so that the mask face can look at the spectators. The dancer wears a long garment with tufts of human hair and two staffs, emblems of strength and authority.
“Kam” is the leader of a so-called “juju” group of dancers, who perform at death celebrations and at festivities in honour of the ancestors. As the principal mask of the “juju”, which carries additional medicines, “kam” controls the other masks. The mask may only be danced by important lineage members.
Expertise
Certificat d' Authenticite, Bernard Dulon, Paris, 22 may 2018
Comparing literature
Northern, Tamara, The Art of Cameroon, Washington D.C. 1984, p. 144 f. Homberger, Lorenz (Hg.), Kamerun, Kunst der Könige, Zürich 2008, ill. 132 f.
Publications
Morigi, Paolo, "Raccolta di un amatore d'arte primitiva", Kunstmuseum Bern, 1980, S. 237, ill. 223; Expo cat.: "Kunst aus Afrika und Ozeanien. Eine unbekannte Privatsammlung / Art d'Afrique et d'Océanie. Une collection privée inconnue", Bern: Kunstmuseum / Musée des Beaux-Arts de Berne, 1980, cat. 223 (not illustrated)AHDRC: 0011575
Exhibition
Bern, Switzerland: "Kunst aus Afrika und Ozeanien. Eine unbekannte Privatsammlung", Kunstmuseum Bern, 22 August-2 November 1980