The Egun mask is a 20th - century piece carved from wood, and from the Yoruba culture located in southwestern Nigeria, as well as north-central and southern Benin. The Yoruba people use the Egun mask in the annual Egun Mask Festival (EMF) in Benin for celebratory purposes. In part of the EMF, the masks are used in ceremonial events, and anonymous dancers wear the masks and take the role of their ancestor. As you take a look at the Egun mask, the first feature you notice is the detailed hairstyle on the mask. Many Yoruba masks have hats or elongated hairstyles in an upright position, but not the Egun mask. The asymmetrical hairstyle is distinctive. This object’s hairstyle points stiffly to the right and is eye-catching due to the countless …show more content…
I focused on the mask’s hairstyle and facial features because as a viewer, those two features attracted me to the mask. I know when I view artifacts in museums I like to view the artifact then look at the text display for details about the piece I may have missed in addition to background information about the artifact. I attempted to be as detailed as possible with the hair design. As a viewer, a few questions popped into my head as I studied the hair: why is the hairstyle asymmetrical, how is the hair designed created, and was this hairstyle meant to be in a three-dimensional view. These questions allowed me to become as detailed as possible to help the viewer discover details they may have missed from their cursory glance. I had a hard time finding why the hairstyle was created to look stiff and asymmetrical, so I merely focused on describing the hairstyle in a three-hundred and sixty degrees …show more content…
Similarly to the hairstyle, I wanted the viewer to read about the detailed face of the mask just in case they may have missed it during a cursory glance. In addition, I wanted to inform the reader about the Yorubaland people to understand how important and intricate each detail is to the culture. As I studied the mask, the number three was a recurring number of tribal markings, so I found and included why this number three is important to the Yorubaland people. Thus informing the reader how sophisticated the mask’s details are. Interestingly enough, I found it important that the tribal markings also separated the Yorubaland people in many ways: identifying family members and beauty modification, which is new information for the average reader. Lastly, I believe it is important for the reader to understand that the tribal marking practice still occurs today to put in context that this mask to represents a functioning culture that still exists
Masks are a way an individual expresses themselves with various types of people. We are given different occasions and have to act a certain way to do so. Gergen states that the cause of having a mask is “When an individual seeks approval from this diverse range of personalities,he or she adopts a wholly different mask or public identities.” (197) Each person has a different personality when they are with certain people, based on actions and reactions. For instance, when having a guest visiting for the first time, we tend to look our best and choose the best way to make them feel welcome. We tend to hide things that don 't seem “appropriate” and take out things that seem new. We probably don’t notice, but we create a mask based on appearance since we are hiding the reality based on their first
Traditionally, Chinese face masks were used in folk art performances before the Song Dynasty, which eventually transform into a facial paint masks in the Song and Yuan Dynasties. During the Qing Dynasty the arrival of European culture and the opera provided a way to merge Chinese and European culture in the use of painted folk art facial masks. The meaning of the mask focuses on the heart and soul of the mythological or fictional character being represented on the stage. In this manner, the design and color of the mask imbues a powerful sense of emotive and symbolic meaning for the audience to observe in the actions of the performers. Certainly, the “heart and soul” of painted facial mask defines the foundation of Chinese folk art culture to project a profound sense of drama in the Beijing Opera medium. In essence, these are the important aspects of the meaning of the Beijing Opera painted facial mask, which define the powerful emotive and cultural transmission of folk art into the modern setting of the European-styled
The chain mail armor is a medieval armor type that was used commonly in both the western and Islamic world. However, the chain mail found in the Islamic world stands out due to its characteristics and Islamic references. Displayed in the Sharjah Museum of Islamic Civilization, is a damascened steel chain mail body armor belonging to the late Ottoman Turkey, Iran or India. The armor called a hauberk would cover one’s body starting from their shoulders, leaving the neck exposed to be covered from three sides by the mail from the helmet. It would cover one’s full torso, hands till one’s elbows and extend till ones knees with a divided slit starting from the end of the torso so that it is not a hindrance to movement. This mail armor would be made according to the person’s size and would weigh around 13 kilograms (Fliegel, 2007). This armor is worn along with a helmet made out of the same material and accompanied with a decorated shield. The armor in the Sharjah museum of Islamic civilization is made of out damascened steel, i.e. inlaid with gold and dark golden in color. It is accompanied with a helmet inscribed with narrow bands of arabesque patterns on the head piece of the helmet and with a decorated arm shield. Such Islamic armors were often decorated with a wide variety of inscriptions of Qur'anic passages, which functioned, as powerful defenses in the form of lucky charms, or simply as visually pleasing ornament.
Hair Care is another popular africanism present in America for African americans. For african american woman going for a natural hairstyle is quite common. Dating back to pre-colonial africa a natural afro hair style defined status and identity. Different styles indicated certain qualitie...
Western attitudes to African people and culture have always affected how their art was appreciated and this has also coloured the response to the art from Benin.
In Visibly Muslim, Emma Tarlo discusses the visibility of ethnicity in a contemporary urban setting. Emma Tarlo asks ‘why and how all types of clothing that identify the people that wear them as Muslim are usually grouped together and perceived by people outside as monotone, retrograde and repressive,’ when, in fact, ‘far from promoting an image of dull uniformity, the headscarf is often the most self-consciously elaborated element of an outfit, that has in recent years beco...
African method and style to portraiture often replaced idealism for realism, images of rulers carved in a specific style tradition tended to look very much alike. As a result, personal and historical motifs unique to each ruler were often engaged for purposes of being different. The royal subject of an ndop sculpture could have been identified by his ibol, a royal mark that was exposed at the moment of his coronation. Portraits that used personal and historical motifs are also found among the cast brass and carved ivory sculptures of the kingdom of Benin. Obas (kings) and other citizens of the court were identified from one another through costume and ceremonial equipment as well as variations in scale and the most important sculpture in a gathering was the largest one. However, other motifs were used to represent specific individuals were cast brass objects, an ukhurhe (rattle staff) and an ikegobo (altar to the hand) featured depictions of unique individuals. The ukhurhe was used to summon a ruler's attendance at final court ceremonies. Akenzua's, one of the rulers ...
Like all masks, they conceal a trait of something or someone by showing something different. In the same way, my mask hides my fear of events that will happen in the future, but shows personalities that are usually happy or joyful. How my mask does this is by showing a pattern instead of what I am. What my mask consists of is a pattern of lines, biggest to smallest from the outside to the center. There is also a comma like dots that go on the circle. What this pattern means is that the lines represent the different personalities I could have like being happy or either excited. Like
African hair sculpture is what they call it and Africa and to them it is an art. Africans hardly ever leave their hair or their body plain or in the book, it says “natural” state. It says that they spend a lot of time and energy on grooming and self-admiration. Sounds like it’s the same way there as it is here because I love to “groom.” Ha ha. Anyway, it says they spend a lot of time on their hair and looks but special attention to their hair. The “art” of hairdressing was practiced mostly for women and male hairdressers can hardly be found. The book says that the skill of hairdressing has been handed down from generation to generation and requires artistry, manual dexterity, and patience because many of their styles are elaborate and time-consuming. For most African women hair is a medium for creative self-expression.
After visiting the Harn Museum and examining all of the pieces of Art in the Africa Collection, Lo Gbe, or “White Mask”, caught my attention almost instantly. The colors of this costume are mostly white with some black spots in certain areas. The mask is made of white cowry shells, wood, and metal and has a large extension on the top of the head, and the rest of the costume is made of white and black cotton. Lo Gbe is a costume that is used for a traditional dance called a “White Mask Dance” that is common in the Burkina Faso country of Africa. The dance is done in order to honor and remember the dead. The dance is only done at night and usually lasts to 4:00 AM because the moon plays a major roll in the dance as it reflects beautifully off of the mask because of the white shells. It is not stated when this tradition of honoring the deceased started
Paul Laurence Dunbar’s “We Wear the Mask” is a lyric poem in which the point of attraction, the mask, represents the oppression and sadness held by African Americans in the late 19th century, around the time of slavery. As the poem progresses, Dunbar reveals the façade of the mask, portrayed in the third stanza where the speaker states, “But let the dream be otherwise” (13). The unreal character of the mask has played a significant role in the lives of African Americans, who pretend to put on a smile when they feel sad internally. This occasion, according to Dunbar, is the “debt we pay to human guile," meaning that their sadness is related to them deceiving others. Unlike his other poems, with its prevalent use of black dialect, Dunbar’s “We Wear the Mask” acts as “an apologia (or justification) for the minstrel quality of some of his dialect poems” (Desmet, Hart, and Miller 466).
The African mask tattoo represents the egwugwu, or the nine masked Umuofia elders. They are seen as ancestral gods and are judges in the community. “And when, as on that day, nine of the greatest masked spirits in the clan came out together it was a terrifying spectacle”. They
In "Identity" the short film by KJ Adams, The filmmaker uses the symbol of the mask to show that people hide identities.It is only when the protagonists mask breaks that she reveals her true self.In the beginning of the story we see a girl, the protagonist putting on a unique white decorated mask.The protagonists mask seems too be a symbol that she is scared what people think about her true identity because her peers may not accept her differences, so she wears a mask.The author uses the pattern of diffrent solid colored masks throuout the film to symbolize the white decorated protagonists mask as diffrent than all the kids in high school. As the story progresses we are found in a classroom where the teacher is talking about Plato’s Allegory,
Sisala is a tribe originating from Ghana and is known for their distinct markings. A lady from Sisala was interviewed by Margaret Ankrah, an exceptional journalist, who told the story of the challenges she faced after being scared. The Sisala woman was not allowed to go into her daughter’s school because she had tribal markings on her face. They said it will traumatize the children. Her markings were seen as barbaric and uncivilized. Everyday she has to face a crowd of people staring at her tribal markings wondering what happened to her. She feels as though everyone judges her by the tribal markings on her face instead of her character (Ankrah 3). This woman is one of many people who undergo scarification.
description is made at the end of the story. The movie gave you the chance to make your opinion on looks