Mask ·  Mali, Dogon · ID: 3032534

Description

heavy wood, kaolin, black and red paint, a flat and narrow facial plane with raised forehead crest and elongated nose bridge, two pairs of eyes, the lower one serving as see holes for the dancer, who additionally fixes the mask with a crossbar on the back of the mask by holding it with the teeth, remains of drilled cord material, vertical grooves on both sides, slightly dam., cracks, paint rubbed off;
while the sculptures are carved by the blacksmiths, the masks are carved by young men of the “awa” society. All the masks belong to the “awa” societies and appear during the “dama” burial ceremonies. Those are held every two or three years to honour the deceased. They are depicting animals, objects or humans and are made of plant fibres, fabric or wood.

The object Mask with the object ID 3032534 was last part of the auction 68th tribal art auction at March 3, 2012 on Zemanek-Münster Auction house. The object with the lot number 294 achieved a sales price of EUR 1,500.

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.