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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…
Ejagham Masks: The Skin-Covered Faces of the Ngbe Leopard Society
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Most African helmet masks are carved, painted, and left as wood. Ejagham carvers, working in the Cross River region straddling southeastern Nigeria and Cameroon, took an additional and genuinely unusual step: they stretched real…
Grebo Masks: The War Face Built to Terrify, and the Chief Who Ruled Alone
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Nearly every people documented in this book’s Liberian section organizes at least part of village authority through the Poro society, the region’s dominant men’s institution. The Grebo, a little-known ethnic group of eastern Liberia’s…
Mossi Masks: What the Conquered People Kept When the Rulers Took the Statues
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Most of the masking traditions covered on this site emerged from societies without a strong central government, villages, clans, and secret societies filling the gap a king or a unified state might otherwise occupy….
Why African Masks Are Not Home Décor
In many parts of the world, an African mask is commonly used as decoration. It may hang on a living room wall, sit on a shelf, or be placed as a centrepiece in a modern interior. While visually striking, this use of African masks represents a complete shift from their original cultural purpose. Traditionally, African…
Bassa Masks: The Gela Dancer Who Performs Feminine Grace for an All-Male Society
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Several masking traditions documented in this book use a mask’s design to project fear, authority, or ancestral weight. The Bassa of Liberia’s central coastal region built a tradition around the opposite register entirely: a…