Dance mask

On the banks of the Sepik and Ramu rivers in eastern New Guinea, carved masks depicting stylized human faces, embodying the ancestral spirit of a clan member or a supernatural spirit, are ubiquitous. Very rarely worn.
This mask features holes in the ears and nose for the attachment of ornaments. There is still a trace of a horizontal stick used to grip the dancer, as well as a pierced protrusion at the top of the forehead, used to attach the mask to a mobile support, leaning against a wall inside the ceremonial house. Evidence that it was worn during ceremonies. According to Dorota Czarkowska Starzecka of a related mask in the British Museum collections, some were also “used in initiation ceremonies” (“Masks in Oceania” Masks: the Art of Expression, 1996, p.73). During the ceremony, the supernatural presence embodied by the mask was reinforced by the oratorical, musical and choreographic accompaniment that characterized the highly dynamic ceremonies of New Guinea. The red color obtained by successive applications of pigment, crusty in places, bears witness to the mask’s great age. Price: 11,000 euros