The Central African tribe of the Punu have created hundreds of masks over time, but there is one type of mask that is more celebrated. According to the University of Virginia's Faces of the Spirits, these masks are called the Okuyi or Mukudj masks. A generally wooden mask, colored either white, black, or red, these masks are a work of art. They even appeal to many museum collectors. These wooden masks are significant to that culture because they are used in rituals, music and celebrate this culture’s pride in their women.
Okuyi masks are connected with a right of passage that is practiced by several tribes around Central Africa. The multiple rituals are performed at various special occasions including weddings and funerals. One of the most different occasions is when a child reaches four months of age, becomes an adolescent or an adult. The Okuyi dancer would perform by dancing in short and fast parts, stomping their feet on the ground, to a beat played by drums and sticks. During the performance, a chorus of women join in the background, singing to the ancestors.
The ...
In Kimberly Springer’s anthology, Skin Deep, Spirit Strong: The Black Female Body in American Culture, she has different articles in the book that are written by a variety of women. The articles in the book break down and discuss areas of history and time-periods that shaped the representation and current understanding of the black female body. Many ideals of how society preserves the black female body to be is based on historical context that the authors in Springers book further explain. The two articles that I am going to focus on are Gender, Race and Nation: The Comparative Anatomy of “Hottentot” Women in Europe 1815-17 and Mastering the Female Pelvis: Race and the Tools of Reproduction.
The Kwakiutl Indian tribe existed before the discovery of North America by the European culture and inhabited the coast of the Pacific Northwest of the United States and British Columbia in Canada. The tribe is rich in tradition and culture and has remained steadfast in their beliefs, history, teachings and artisan skills which have been passed down generation to generation. The artisans in the Kwakiutl tribe mastered the art of creating special ceremonial masks that are not only beautiful and aesthetically interesting to the eye, but also mechanically intriguing in which the masks serve a specific purpose to a theme during different ceremonies that are conducted by tribal specialists during certain times throughout the year.
The mask is part of the ceremony known as "the Dance of the Goats” or La Danza de los Chivos. The mask on masksoftheworld.com is from Chilpancingo, State of Guerrero, Mexico. However, the traditional Dance of the Goats began in Zitlala, State of Guerrero, Mexico. The villagers created the dance after the Mexican Revolution in 1910. After the war, an epidemic took place that eliminated almost all livestock in the area. Even with the epidemic, the people were able to complete the construction of their primary church, but afterwards were left with nothing. They decided to approach the patron saint of the village, St. Nicholas to express their concerns and worries. Once they were before him, they dressed and danced as goats. Afterwards, the villagers believed that Saint Nicholas had performed a miracle. From then on, they perform the ceremony every year on the day of St. Nicholas on September 10th. The dance represents the tradition of rural life that portrays peasant life and the daily struggle to keep the heritage of peasant families alive. The idea is to capture daily life through art. The purpose of the mask used in this dance is to transform the dancers into the character of a goat.
The mask’s purpose to teach young girls about proper womanhood. While worn in ceremony, the girls learn through observing the mask wearer dancing and taking in the stories, types of dances, proper way to care for their families, and providing for their family like
There are any kinds of masks. There is the story; the masks are the masks that tell
This is almost a tribal ritual making a mask. The boys use masks to cover their identity and this allows them to kill.
Leading up to the celebration the girls are taught a certain dance that must be performed at the ceremony. “the new initiates are brought into town for the first time since the initiation process began…” At the ceremony the Mende girls wear a Sowei mask and costume which is considered to be the embodiment of the river spirt Sowo. Once the mask and costume is on the person transforms and her actions are no longer hers but are the actions of the spirt Sowo. A sacred dance is performed and dance moves represent the strength and power of woman as members in the Mende community. “Sowo mask are divided into three structural components- the neck, face, and coiffure. Carved from a single block of lightweight wood, the masks weigh only two to four pounds. The mask displays a shiny black surface representative of the value assigned to smooth dark skin.” The rings around the masks neck demonstrates a trait that is considered beautiful in Mende cultures. Every mask has a different hairstyle, representing the style of the woman the mask is made for, you can see items such as shells, metal and claws on the coiffure.
...sion called the designator, and there would people wearing masks made of wax to represent the deceased and their ancestors. (Gill) At first when they did the funeral processions, they all took place at night. As the traditions slowly changed over time; this tradition was only used for the poorer of the people.
The ideal female beauty in American culture is predominately white (Bankhead & Johnson, 2014). Throughout U.S history, women’s mainstream beauty ideal has been historically based on white standards such as having blonde hair, blue eyes, fair skin, a thin ideal body, straight hair, and thin lips (West, 1995; Yamamiya, Cash, Melynk, Posavac, & Posavac, 2005; Leslie, 1995). Therefore, the features of African American women tend to be viewed as undesirable and unattractive compared to the European standards of beauty (Awad, Norwood, Taylor, Martinez, McClain, Jones, Holman, & Hilliard, 2014). According to Ashe (1995), “African beauty, body and hair have been racialized, with slim/”keen” European features being the accepted standard of beauty since enslaved Africans was forcefully brought to the Americas.” The physical characteristics of Black women such as having broad noses, brown skin, full lips, large buttocks and course hair has been looked down upon throughout United States history (Byrd & Tharps, 2001). In effect, the standard of beauty of European features that were forced on slaves are internalized and currently seen in the standard of beauty of African Americans (A.A) (Chapman, 2007). These standards include African Americans perceiving light-skinned as being more favorable than dark-skinned (Maddox & Gray, 2002; Perdue, Young, Balam,
Sande are a group which are much like the Poro, and the Sande are also known as the Bundu, Bundo, Bondo, and the ZadEgi. The society is made up entirely of girls and women, and are responsible for preparing the girls for adulthood. (Sande, Heritge) Today the Sande society can be found in the same countries as the Poro, and “is not a centralised institution, but rather is numerous more or less independent local lodges with common practices and traditions” according to Henry M of mytholyoke.com. Higher ranking members of the Sande are known as the Sowei, and the most recognizable Sande public figure is the masker called Ndoli Jowei which means the Dancing Sowei, who wears a black-dyed wooden helmet above a costume of black dyed raffia and cloth. (Sande, Heritage) Members of the Sande can also wear special masks and helmets that are sacred to the Sande people. These masks can symbolize many different things about the member, or the initiate. Some of the masks can mean beauty; which is special to the Mende people, and is said to represent an idealized image of female beauty and dignity. Another Sande mask design is the womanly characteristic of wisdom, which is represented with showcasing a high forehead. All Sande members believe that all women should become Nyaha, which means to become initiated within Sande. (Henry,
In Ancient Egypt, women are typically shown as youthful and beautiful while more mature, older women are very rarely depicted. For men of the time, ageing is shown in art more frequently because it was a positive aspect of manhood. For ancient Egyptians, art wasn’t just made for pleasure or beauty; it was a very practical and necessary part of the day-to-day lives of the Egyptians. In art, Egyptian belief was that people needed to be depicted at their peak of energy and beauty in order to remain that way forever when they cross over into the afterlife. In most ancient Egyptian art, male ageing is represented more frequently than women since it was considered a positive image for men. Egyptian art seldom depicted older women or women growing older: "neither pregnancy nor the spreading waistline that many women must have had after years of bearing children is part of the image." However, there are examples that feature elements of ageing that are linked to elite and non-elite women alike. These demonstrations of older women are possibly an attempt to outwardly show on women the authority and honor in the same way the image of male ageing is represented. Though it is rarely depicted, we can use art to trace the portrayal of older women and women growing older in Egypt, from the Third Dynasty down to the end of the New Kingdom.
For a long time now body art and decoration has been a custom in many cultural groups. Through research we have learned about the different types of body art and ornamentation such as permanent and nonpermanent tattooing, scarification, and piercings. These forms of body art and ornamentation are done for a variety of reasons, ranging from identification purposes to religious rituals. “Skin, as a visible way of defining individual identity and cultural difference, is not only a highly elaborated preoccupation in many cultures; it is also the subject of wide-ranging and evolving scholarly discourse in the humanities and social sciences” (Schildkrout, 2004). The process of ornamentation and body art is usually a painful experience, but it is a way to signify a person’s self-discovery and their place in society. In this paper, I will explore the different aspects of body art and ornamentation in two different cultures; the Maori people of New Zealand and the Yoruba’s of West Africa and explain the cultural importance of their art.
When we look into the mirror, we are constantly picking at our insecurities; our stomach, thighs, face, and our body figure. Society has hammered into our brains that there is only one right way of looking. Society disregards that there are many different shapes, sizes, and colors. Then society makes us believe that corporations can shove detrimental products to fix our imperfection. As a consequence, we blame media for putting all the negative ideas into women’s brain. It is not wrong to say that they are in part responsible, but we can’t make this issue go away until we talk about patriarchy. In the article Am I Thin Enough Yet? Hesse-Biber argues that women are constantly concerned about their looks and if they are categorized as “beautiful” by society. These ideas are encouraged by corporations that sell things for us to achieve “beautiful” but the idea is a result of patriarchy. Hesse-Biber suggests that if we want to get rid of these ideas we need to tackle patriarchy before placing all the blame on capitalism.
In the slippery terrain created by globalization and cultural brokering, contemporary art made in Africa (and its diasporas) has enjoyed a steady growth in interest and appreciation by Western audiences during the last few decades (Kasfir, 2007). Several biennials, triennials, and scholarly works attest to that, with much of its impact owed to the figure of Okwui Enwezor. However, seamlessly uniting diverse African artists under the untrained Western gaze for the commercialism of the international art circuit – notwithstanding their different cultural contexts and the medium in which they work – is bound to create problems. Enwezor’s and other authors’ sophisticated publications and curatorial works show both the vitality and issues still to be addressed in this field of study (Ogbechie, 2010).
Rarely is one individual blessed with both brains and beauty. Most people are born with one or the other; those having brains sometimes are unfortunate in the “looks” department and those blessed with beauty can be unfortunate in the “smarts” department. As with most things in life, there are both pros and cons to being beautiful. In certain incidences beauty can be a blessing, but in others it can be a curse.