TheMaskedKing @themaskedking - Tumblr Blog

Posts

With its luxuriously modeled flesh and powerful leg thrust and hip torsion perceptible beneath the surface play of the garment, this torso reaffirms the bold beauty of the traditional striding kilted figure. The sixth century B.C. saw the lapse of this elegantly simple, assertively physical pose. At the beginning of the fourth century, the surge of vitality that brought about the overthrow of Persian domination also initiated a period of artistic renewal, during which this quintessentially Egyptian pose was revived.

This example of a brass casting of a Benin head may date to the mid-nineteenth century. The extreme degree of stylization, swollen cheeks and enlarged eyes, the size of the flange at the base, the weight of the casting, and the winglike projections attached to the crowns are characteristic of brass casting during this later period of Benin royal court.

#african #africa #african art #art #oba #king #head #casting #bronze

In the sixties and seventies he focussed solely on the local youth. Caught in surprise snapshots, or posing leisurely, these youngsters drag him along on their numerous wanderings. To sports events, relaxing on the beach, a fight in the nightclub Happy Boys or the Surf Club, out to a concert or seducing girls.

The braided beard and the flat cap with remnants of double plumes identify this god as Amun. His small eyes are separated by a curved depression from the rounded brow ridge; his broad face shows full lips with sharp contours, and, from the side, a slightly drooping chin. These features closely parallel those of King Tutankhamun and mark the piece as his commission. The statue was certainly created for Karnak, Amun's great temple at Thebes, as part of Tutankhamun's restoration of the god's monuments that had been defaced or destroyed during the reign of Akhenaten. A number of sculptures depict Amun touching the crown of Tutankhamun, who stands or kneels before him. This head seems very large for such a composition, however; thus it is likely that the head originally belonged to a large freestanding or seated figure of the god.

The similarities between this piece and late Amarna art suggest that sculptors from Amarna were active in Thebes during Tutankhamun's reign. The combination of the lush physicality of the mouth with the distant, veiled gaze of the small eyes beneath shadowing brows creates a tension. These features-as in late Amarna art, and like similar tensions in the faces of late Middle Kingdom sculptures,-were probably meant to convey a kind of interiority or reflectiveness.

Fore more information, click here

Bamana notions of ideal beauty and character are evoked in this figure of a mother and child. The figure is part of a corpus of large, relatively naturalistic sculptures whose rounded volumes and variety of gestures depart from the angular forms and stiff postures characteristic of many other types of Bamana sculpture. These figures are displayed at the annual ceremonies of "Jo", an association of initiated Bamana men and women, and at the rituals of "Gwan", a related society whose purpose is to help women conceive and bear children. Groups of sculptures which were collectively owned by individual communities to be publicly exhibited on such occasions, included representations of a mother and child, a male companion, and related attendant figures.

For more information on this piece, click here

#Africa #African Art #Art #Traditional Art #Wood #Wooden statue #Bamana #Bamana people

For more information on Kehinde Wiley, click here

#African Art #Art #Modern Art #Kehinde #Kehinde Wiley #Painting #Colorful #Black

Bwa masquerades draw upon the stylized features of humans, animals, and even insects. This mask is called duho, which means hawk (or sometimes duba, meaning vulture). The wings of the primarily two-dimensional hawk mask are usually simply decorated with white paint. The face of the hawk has been reduced to basic geometric forms. An inverted triangle defines the "face" and contains a protuberant, conical mouth and two sets of concentric circles for eyes. The outwardly projecting beak and the hook at the top of the face are two of the few elements that serve as a contrast to the overall planar nature of this nature spirit representation. Bold geometric shapes repeated in brightly painted designs are often added to enliven the surfaces of these relatively abstract forms. Bwa nature spirit masks are particularly impressive due to their commanding size and shape. This hawk mask's horizontal span extends nearly five feet wide; the wingspan of a related representation of the butterfly (yehoti) may be up to six or seven feet. Despite their daunting scale, these face masks are indeed worn by a performer, who bites on a thick fiber rope that passes through holes in the mask to secure it to his face. The mask is also attached to a fiber costume that covers the head and body of the performer. The choreography of the performance is derived from the movements and behavior of a hawk or vulture.

For more information on this piece, click here

#African art #Africa #Traditional art #Bwa #West africa #West african art

The Mahafaly peoples of Madagascar honor the deceased members of chiefly and royal lineages by creating burial sites of imposing grandeur. Each tomb is a solid boxlike stone sculpture that may be surmounted by as many as thirty wood sculptures. These wooden tomb sculptures commemorate deceased individuals while addressing more abstract concepts concerning the nature of existence after death and the relationship between living and dead. Funerary sculpture is understood not as a direct or literal portrait of the deceased but as a locus of connection with the ancestral realm. The Mahafaly have adopted the term aloalo to refer strictly to the works that are used at royal burial sites. Aloalo is derived from alo, which implies a sense of an intermediary or messenger; the term therefore refers primarily to the work's function and not necessarily its form. Alo also relates to the creation of linkages and, in the context of funerary sculpture, may refer to the visual interlocking of abstract forms integrated into a harmonious design as well the work's role as an intermediary between the worlds of the living and dead. This example follows an established design in which a standing figure is represented at the base and surmounted by an elaborate vertical openwork column of geometric forms terminating in a figurative finial. The main figure comprising the lower half of the sculpture is depicted wearing a dress-like garment that ends at the knees. There is a slight modeling of breasts on the figure, yet its gender ultimately remains ambiguous. The iconography of the standing figure is unusual in that it is clothed, as classic aloalo forms feature a nude figure. The figure's left arm remains stiffly at its side, while its right arm is raised to cover its mouth. The meaning of this hand-to-mouth gesture is unknown, as it is also uncommon in aloalo.

For more information on this piece, click here

#Africa #African art #African photography #Early photography #Seydou keita

This sculpture gives eloquent expression to the shared and symmetrical responsibilities of men and women in Dogon society. The virtually identical forms of the male and female protagonists in this visual commentary accentuate the parity of their subtly distinctive roles. The two figures share lucid, graphic, and repeated elongated vertical elements with only infrequent differences. For example, on the male figure, a beard extends the chin while the female figure wears a labret, an ornament in the lip. Additionally, where he has a smooth torso, she has elongated breasts that droop from the suckling of multiple children. On the reverse side, the female figure carries a baby on her back, the male a quiver. She is responsible for child care, he for providing sustenance. He has one hand on his genitals and the other protectively draped across her shoulders and resting on her breast. This emphasizes their mutual roles in procreation and nurturing. Male and female are connected to one another by his gesture, but additionally are articulated as discrete units. This approach reflects Dogon attitudes toward marriage as a partnership of independent equals. This balanced duality is also a central tenet of Dogon mythology.

For more information on this piece, click here

#African art #Africa #Dogon #Mali #West africa #Traditional art #wood #wooden art #sculpture

In 1991, when Keïta's photographs were exhibited in New York, they were unsigned and he was unknown outside Africa. Soon after, the details of his photographic career emerged and international acclaim followed. He is considered a leader of a classic tradition of studio photographers working in Mali in the 1950s. His signature compositions, combining pattern on pattern, identify his unique, innovative style of photography. For more information on Seydou Keita, click here

#African Art #Africa #Photography #Textiles #Seydou keita #Keita #Early photography #African Photography #women

#Africa #African art #Sculpture #Mali #Dogon #Traditional art #West africa

For more information on this piece, click here

This lidded basket is an outstanding example of an important form of expression from South Africa's rural Kwazulu-Natal region. Grasses and grasslike plants are readily available natural resources in the Kwazulu-Natal region that the Zulu have incorporated into many domestic artifacts, including floor mats, spoon holders, and various kinds of baskets such as this example from the Museum's collection. The origins of the weaving tradition remain unknown, but European accounts describe the use of grass and related plants by the Zulu as early as the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

Baskets historically served as utilitarian containers in everyday Zulu life that were usually decorated with very simple designs or left completely devoid of ornament. Recently, individual weavers who create artifacts for the art market as well as for everyday use have introduced complex designs and color schemes to the tradition of basket weaving. This basket is a superb example of the work of one of southern Africa's preeminent contemporary weavers who has blurred the line between utilitarian craft and fine art. Its creator, Beauty Nxgongo, is nationally known for her distinctive baskets with vibrant designs. Though strongly rooted in the weaving tradition of southern Africa, Nxgongo's work is created for art's sake and praised for its aesthetic excellence. This work exemplifies her oeuvre, in which elegant structural forms are enhanced by complex and masterful graphic and chromatic designs. The toplike form of this basket tapers at the summit and the base, and is rounded at the sides. A woven graphic motif of undulating zigzags covers the entire surface. The various colors were all obtained from natural sources. For example, black or very dark fibers were produced by boiling the ilala palms with the indigo plant, while reddened sorghum leaves were used to produce fibers with a reddish brown color. Nxgongo's work is represented in all the major South African museums, including the South African National Gallery in Cape Town.

For more information on this piece, click here

#Africa #African Art #South Africa #Beaded Basket #Basket #Beads #Bead art #Traditional art #Tribal art

South African sculptors created skillfully designed and executed functional artifacts used in everyday life. The role of the walking stick in the Zulu society was so ubiquitous that there are more than seventy five terms for different type of sticks. In the highly stratified society, they were carried by commoners and high-ranking officials alike for walking, dancing, hunting and combat.

For more information on this piece, click here

#Africa #African art #South Africa #Staff #Traditional art #Wooden staff #Wood

Dogon art is primarily sculpture. Dogon art revolves around religious values, ideals, and freedoms (Laude, 19). Dogon sculptures are not made to be seen publicly, and are commonly hidden from the public eye within the houses of families, sanctuaries, or kept with the Hogon (Laude, 20). The importance of secrecy is due to the symbolic meaning behind the pieces and the process by which they are made.

Themes found throughout Dogon sculpture consist of figures with raised arms, superimposed bearded figures, horsemen, stools with caryatids, women with children, figures covering their faces, women grinding pearl millet, women bearing vessels on their heads, donkeys bearing cups, musicians, dogs, quadruped-shaped troughs or benches, figures bending from the waist, mirror-images, aproned figures, and standing figures (Laude, 46-52). Signs of other contacts and origins are evident in Dogon art. The Dogon people were not the first inhabitants of the cliffs of Bandiagara. Influence from Tellem art is evident in Dogon art because of its rectilinear designs (Laude, 24). For more information about Dogon art, click here

#African art #Traditional art #Dogon #Metal #Africa #West Africa

Key stylistic elements of the Luba statue include coffee bean-shaped eyes, tiny eyes, grooved bands over the hairlines and ornamental cicatrices carved in high relief on the surfaces. Recurrent elements of Luba sculpture include the females in these postures: standing, kneeling and sitting with their hands holding their breasts or wrapped around bowls. The chief functions of Luba statues are divination, healing and initiation. Therefore, they mostly belong to ancestor and spirit cults. These cults have women as their guardians.

Luba masks are of two popular kinds. The more popular one is the kifewebe. The kifewebe masks originated from the Luba and are also made by theirSongye neighbors. It is an elaborate combination of white and black stripes, often with white stripes over black backgrounds. They are made for and danced by the kifewebe secret cult.

The origin story behind the kifewebe mask identifies its source with the appearance of three spirits from a lake in the region. Of these three spirits, two were male and one was female. The female spirit chose to live in the village among men while the male spirits kept to the bush. However, these male spirits would sometimes visit the village, thrilling the men with their dancing until they begged to be initiated.

Kifewebe masks may be rounded or elongated but they all have linear patterns in white and black. They have broad noses, rectangular mouths and flattened crests. Female kifewebe masks are differentiated from the male by the presence of beautifying geometric patterns such as crosses, dots, triangles and chevrons.

These masks are danced in male-female pairs and are believed to link the spirit world to our world. Their appearances are mostly at times of tribal change such as the death of a chief or the political promotion of an important person. In addition, these masks come out on the nights of full moon to honor their ancestors.

For more information about Luba masks, click here

Trending Blogs

Recently Viewed Blogs

TheMaskedKing