Stories shape the world, and you probably already know this. Behind every great movement led by people was a proportionately great story. The very famous proverb by one of Africa’s best storytellers, Chinua Achebe, explains this perfectly. He said that ‘until the lion learns how to write, the tale of the hunt will always glorify…
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Some masks announce a ceremony. The Toma built one that announced a disappearance. When the massive landai mask called, the boys of the community left the village and went “on retreat” into the forest…
The striped Kifwebe mask of the Luba and Songye peoples is one of the most visually distinctive in all of African art. Here is the story behind the design.
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Most masks in this book represent a single, coherent idea, an ancestor, a spirit of the bush, a moral category of the dead. The Chamba mask, worn along the Benue River in Cameroon and…
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Some of the masking traditions documented in this book come with rich, well-recorded ritual explanations, a specific society, a specific ceremony, a specific meaning attached to each carved feature. The Lele, occupying the western…