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Rare Water Spirit Initiator Mask
Art of Africa, Oceania, and Tribal Worlds - Dave DeRoche
This mask, possibly hand-held, was carved of steatite, probably in the first half of the 20th century. Dan youths would be taken for initiation rites to a bush camp which abutted a river. There they would learn the requirements of Dan male adulthood. At the river's edge they would be circumcised. Rare masks of stone (or occasionally metals such as lead or zinc) would appear from under the water, worn by a dancer and depicting the actual bush spirit of the camp.
$7,500.00
Artwork details
Origin
Dan people, Liberia, Africa
Dimension
H 9.5IN x W 5.75IN x D 2IN
H 24.13CM x W 14.605CM x D 5.08CM
Provenance
Collected in Liberia in the 1960s--1970s by American geologists. Their son recently brought it to Dave DeRoche, who requested research by author and African art historian Scott Rodolitz. Rodolitz was familiar with two other examples, one shown to him by the late Dr. William Siegmann, long in the Tenafly, NJ, museum of the SMA Fathers, the other in a private collection.