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Baule Goli Mask: The Four-Character Dance Masquerade of Côte d’Ivoire
The Goli masquerade is a four-part performance with distinct mask characters. Explore what each represents and how the ceremony unfolds.
Uncover the Mysteries of African Masks at Rituals
Somewhere in a living room in Berlin, or Brooklyn, or a quiet suburb in Surrey, an African mask hangs on a wall. The owner walks past it every morning. They bought it at an estate sale, or inherited it from a relative who did volunteer work in West Africa in the 1970s. They think it…
Mbole Masks and the Ofika: Carved Warnings From a Society That Hanged Its Own
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Most ancestor figures in this book commemorate someone worth remembering fondly, a chief, a founder, a mother of the lineage. The Mbole carved figures meant to commemorate the opposite kind of person entirely: men…
Vili Masks: A Police Force in Paint, on the Atlantic Coast
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Most masks on this site are built to communicate with ancestors, spirits, or the dead. Vili masks did that too, but they were also handed a much more immediate, secular job: keeping order at…
Salampasu Masks: Copper Faces of a Warrior Society in the Congo
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Some African masks were inherited with a family name. A Salampasu mask was not one of them. To wear one, a man had to do something first: perform a specific deed, pay in livestock…
African Masks For Sale, A Buyer’s Guide
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Say you want to buy an African mask. Good. Before you spend a cent, know one thing. That search term covers everything from a twenty dollar decorative carving at a home goods store to…