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African-masks.org - Beautiful African Masks from a private collection |
Collecting African masks
The historic creation and usages for ceremonial or ritualistic purposes of african masks is widespread across the continent of Africa. However, because Africa is so vast, with many tribes, cultures and groups, there are also many types of african tribal art. Because we can not possibly list every type of african masks for every single tribe, we will discuss basic types of african masks and their use .The basic african masks types we will discuss include the face mask, the headdress mask,the helmet mask, the forehead mask, the horizontal plank mask, and the body or belly mask. Each of the african masks are worn differently and we will discuss them each, more-in-depth, below.
The Face Mask:
The face mask is one of the most common african masks. It is usually not attached directly to the front of the face, but is generally held in front of face as a piece of a larger costume or head covering. Some of these african masks are worn by a stick inside of the mask and hold by the teeth. Prior to wearing one of these african masks, the dancer is rubbed down with natural oils to ward off any evil spirits. Therefore the worn masks show a darker color at that places, where they were touched by the oily skin. Face masks have holes for the eyes and these have to be at the right place . Therefore experienced collectors try whether they can look through the holes provided for looking
Some pictures from our gallery of african masks:
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African Masks fascinate - so enjoy them! If you want to dicuss, you can also visit our message board african tribal art
Collection of african masks Dr. Anton Mentrup, Parcusstr. 5, 55116 Mainz, Germany
Mail: nadu [at] foren24.com