Helmet mask
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Object Details
- Kaiwa, from Jong chiefdom, Bonthe
- Sherbro artist
- Mende artist
- Label Text
- Helmet masks called sowei among the Mende, Sherbro and Vai and zogbe among the Gola of Sierra Leone and Liberia are performed by members of the female Sande society. The masks are danced in public during ceremonies that mark the transition of young girls to womanhood and also at the investiture and funeral of a paramount chief.
- The consistent form of the mask emphasizes standards of feminine beauty that reflect ideal moral qualities. The masks are typically stained black and ornamented with elaborate coiffures, scarification marks and thick neck rings. Small facial features are clustered toward the lower third of the mask, below a high forehead. Hairstyles take a variety of forms, including a multi-lobed style, popular at the turn of the 20th century, composed of graduated ridges running from front to back and with the highest rising at the center of the head. The coiffure is sometimes surmounted by a carved depiction of a hat, an overturned cast-iron cooking pot or an animal such as a lizard, a snake or a bird (the latter two in this example), and it may be ornamented with rectilinear motifs suggesting medicine packets or amulets. The exaggerated neck rings denote a woman’s beautifully lined neck, but they have also been interpreted as suggesting the ripples on the surface of the water as the Sande spirit emerges during initiation rites. Holes along the base of the mask would have held a black-fiber fringe, which formed part of a fiber masquerade costume that concealed the identity of the female performer. Masks are typically commissioned by ranking members of Sande, and it is likely that the elements comprising the mask reflect particular tutelary spirits relevant to the male carver or to the woman who commissioned it.
- The mask has been attributed by the donor to a carver named Kaiwa from Jong chiefdom, Bonthe region, circa 1935, based on a very similar mask published by Ruth Phillips (1995: 128; see comparative image). In considering this attribution, Siegmann’s collection notes state, “Both masks have coiffures arranged into three ridges running front to back. There are pairs of snakes on either side of the coiffure. In each case the tail starts at the front of the hairline and runs to the back of the mask and then moves forward again until the head of the snake rises toward the central ridge upon which is perched a bird in this instance. Snakes are among the most frequently depicted animals on sowei masks. It is highly likely that they refer to Sande ritual practices or beliefs. But what they represent and why the snakes are often seen apparently about to attack birds or a bird about to seize a snake remains unclear.”
- Description
- Helmet mask, dark in coloration, distinguished by a tri-lobed, ridged coiffure encircled by two serpents and surmounted by a bird. Delicate linear incisions ornament the coiffure and frame the high forehead, which is also decorated with two rows of deeper incisions suggesting scarification marks. Facial features are confined to the lower half of the mask: thick, slightly arching eyebrows, narrow eye slits, delicately-rendered projecting nose and pursed elliptical lips. Red abrus seeds emphasize the eyes of the snake and bird.
- Provenance
- William Siegmann, collected in Liberia, 1970s to 2011
- Exhibition History
- African Mosaic: Selections from the Permanent Collection, National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., November 19, 2013–August 12, 2019 (installed April 6, 2016–July 29, 2019)
- Visions from the Forest: The Art of Liberia and Sierra Leone, National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., April 9-August 17, 2014
- Published References
- Phillips, Ruth. 1995. Representing Women: Sande Masquerades of the Mende of Sierra Leone. Los Angeles: Fowler Museum of Cultural History, University of California, p. 128.
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- Credit Line
- Gift of the Estate of William Siegmann in memory of Sylvia Williams
- ca. 1935
- Object number
- 2012-11-1
- Restrictions & Rights
- Usage conditions apply
- Type
- Mask
- Medium
- Wood, pigment, abrus seeds
- Dimensions
- H x W x D: 46.3 x 23.4 x 23.5 cm (18 1/4 x 9 3/16 x 9 1/4 in.)
- Geography
- Sierra Leone
- See more items in
- National Museum of African Art Collection
- Object Name
- sowei
- National Museum of African Art
- Topic
- bird
- Initiation
- Status
- snake
- Female use
- male
- Record ID
- nmafa_2012-11-1
- Metadata Usage (text)
- Usage conditions apply
- GUID (Link to Original Record)
- http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/ys793152981-bc38-4ed6-b5de-e38539a7b4f1
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