Superb Bete Mask, Côte d'Ivoiregle Wood, brass, nails, black patina Height 10 1/2in (26.7cm) Provenance Ben Tursh, Brussels Count Baudouin de Grunne (1917-2011), Wezembeeck-Oppem, Belgium Bernard de Grunne, Brussels Important Private Collection, acquired from the above in 1997 Exhibited Los Angeles, The Inner Eye - Vision and Transcendence in African Arts, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 26 February - 9 July 2017 Cf. Hagner, Iris (ed.), African Masks: The Barbier-Mueller Collection, Prestel Verlag, 2007, pl. 35 for a mask with similar features. Hagner notes (Ibid.), "The Bete are an agriculturalist group who live in southwestern Ivory Coast, between the Bandama and Sassandra rivers. Only the western Bete are known to have a masking tradition, which goes back to the Gla society of the We, and which was adopted by the neighboring Nyabwa. This origin is underscored not only by the use of the Nyabwa language during masquerade dances, but by the fact that every Bete mask wearer is introduced to its use by an initiated Nywaba. Masqueraders perform during burials, at the end of the mourning period, or in honor of important people. Sometimes they or one of their attendants carries a lance. This weapon possibly points to the mask's original function--that of a war mask. The face of this mask [in the Barbier-Muller Collection, and similarly of the mask presented here] is composed of geometric volumes that, as independent bodies, seem to emerge from a flat back panel. The separate features are arranged in horizontal tiers, interrupted in the vertical only by the hooked nose and a low crest extending from the lower ridge of the protruding forehead over the crown of the head. The vertical line thus formed is repeated in the upward sweep of the oversized nostrils, which extend to the corner of the eyes. Between the narrow slit of the eyes and the arch-shape above them, two small rectangular openings have been cut to permit the wearer to see, at least partially. The arch extending from temple to temple may be derived from the front-mounted horns of those Gla masks which, among the We, accompanied warriors into battle or counteracted destructive forces."
Superb Bete Mask, Côte d'Ivoiregle Wood, brass, nails, black patina Height 10 1/2in (26.7cm) Provenance Ben Tursh, Brussels Count Baudouin de Grunne (1917-2011), Wezembeeck-Oppem, Belgium Bernard de Grunne, Brussels Important Private Collection, acquired from the above in 1997 Exhibited Los Angeles, The Inner Eye - Vision and Transcendence in African Arts, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 26 February - 9 July 2017 Cf. Hagner, Iris (ed.), African Masks: The Barbier-Mueller Collection, Prestel Verlag, 2007, pl. 35 for a mask with similar features. Hagner notes (Ibid.), "The Bete are an agriculturalist group who live in southwestern Ivory Coast, between the Bandama and Sassandra rivers. Only the western Bete are known to have a masking tradition, which goes back to the Gla society of the We, and which was adopted by the neighboring Nyabwa. This origin is underscored not only by the use of the Nyabwa language during masquerade dances, but by the fact that every Bete mask wearer is introduced to its use by an initiated Nywaba. Masqueraders perform during burials, at the end of the mourning period, or in honor of important people. Sometimes they or one of their attendants carries a lance. This weapon possibly points to the mask's original function--that of a war mask. The face of this mask [in the Barbier-Muller Collection, and similarly of the mask presented here] is composed of geometric volumes that, as independent bodies, seem to emerge from a flat back panel. The separate features are arranged in horizontal tiers, interrupted in the vertical only by the hooked nose and a low crest extending from the lower ridge of the protruding forehead over the crown of the head. The vertical line thus formed is repeated in the upward sweep of the oversized nostrils, which extend to the corner of the eyes. Between the narrow slit of the eyes and the arch-shape above them, two small rectangular openings have been cut to permit the wearer to see, at least partially. The arch extending from temple to temple may be derived from the front-mounted horns of those Gla masks which, among the We, accompanied warriors into battle or counteracted destructive forces."
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.jpg "Quelle: Christie's")
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