TRADITIONAL AFRICAN MASKS

SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA

MASKS

• Human, animal, mystical creatures
• Ceremonial, celebrations,
• Initiations, religious, death
• War preparation, crop harvesting
• Helmet, crests

CEREMONIAL MASKS

• Worn by chosen dancer
• Trance like state
• Communicate with ancestors represented by mask
• Spirit of ancestor possesses wearer
• Loses human identity

NATURAL MATERIALS

• Wood, pottery,
• Beads, shells, hair, plant fibres
• Sea shells, stones,semi-precious
• Seeds, straw, egg shells, feathers
• Raffia, fabric, teeth, pigments

FORMAL ELEMENTS

• Texture, line, shape, form
• Colour, geometric, abstract
• Stylised, pattern, symmetry
• Ornament, simple,

INFLUENCE

• On how art developed
• Lack of naturalistic depiction
• Well organised forms
• Expressive power
• Cubism, Fauvism, Expressionism

DEVELOPMENT OF ART - MODERNISM

• Ceased to merely just aesthetic/representation
• Exploration of emotional & psychological areas
• Simplification, reorganisation of forms
• Leading to abstraction/conceptual