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History of the Mask
History
of the Mask
Introduction
Mask
- a form of disguise.
It is an object that is frequently worn over or in front of the face to
hide the identity of a person and by its own features to establish
another being. This essential characteristic of hiding and revealing
personalities or moods is common to all masks. As cultural objects they
have been used throughout the world in all periods since the Stone Age
and have been as varied in appearance as in their use and symbolism.
This article deals with the general characteristics, functions, and forms of masks.
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General Characteristics
- Masks have
been designed in innumerable varieties, from the simplest of crude
“false faces” held by a handle to complete head coverings with
ingenious movable parts and hidden faces. Mask makers have shown great
resourcefulness in selecting and combining available materials. Among
the substances utilized are woods, metals, shells, fibers, ivory, clay,
horn, stone, feathers, leather, furs, paper, cloth, and corn husks.
Surface treatments have ranged from rugged simplicity to intricate
carving and from polished woods and mosaics to gaudy adornments.
Masks
generally are worn with a costume, often so complete that it entirely
covers the body of the wearer. Fundamentally the costume completes the
new identity represented by the mask, and usually tradition prescribes
its appearance and construction to the same extent as the mask itself.
Costumes, like the masks, are made of a great variety of materials, all
of which have a symbolic connection with the mask's total imagery.
Ideally the costume should be seen with the mask while the wearer is in
action.
The morphological elements of the mask are with few
exceptions derived from natural forms. Masks with human features are
classified as anthropomorphic and those with animal characteristics as
theriomorphic. In some instances, the mask form is a replication of
natural features or closely follows the lineaments of reality, and in
other instances it is an abstraction. Masks usually represent
supernatural beings, ancestors, and fanciful or imagined figures and
can also be portraits. The localization of a particular spirit in a
specific mask must be considered a highly significant reason for its
existence.
The change in identity of the wearer for that of the
mask is vital, for if the spirit represented does not reside in the
image of the mask, the ritual petitions, supplications, and offerings
made to it would be ineffectual and meaningless. The mask, therefore,
most often functions as a means of contact with various spirit powers,
thereby protecting against the unknown forces of the universe by
prevailing upon their potential beneficence in all matters relative to
life.
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The Making Of Masks
- With few
exceptions, masks have been made by professionals who were either
expert in this particular craft or were noted sculptors or artisans. In
societies in which masks of supernatural beings have played a
significant ceremonial role, it is presumed that the spirit power of
the created image usually is strongly felt by the artist. A primary
belief involved in both the conception and the rendering of these
objects was that spirit power dwelled in all organic and inorganic
matter, and therefore the mask will contain the spirit power of
whatever material was used to make it.
This power is considered
a volatile, active force that is surrounded by various taboos and
restrictions for the protection of those handling it. Certain
prescribed rituals frequently have to be followed in the process of the
mask's creation. A spirit power is also often believed to inhabit the
artist's tools so that even these have to be handled in a prescribed
manner. As the form of the mask develops it is usually believed to
acquire power increasingly in its own right, and again various
procedures are prescribed to protect the craftsman and to ensure the
potency of the object.
If all the conventions have been adhered
to, the completed mask, when worn or displayed, is regarded as an
object suffused with great supernatural or spirit power. In some
cultures it is believed that because of the close association between
the mask maker and the spirit of the mask, the artist absorbs some of
its magic power. A few West African tribal groups in Mali believe, in
fact, that the creators of masks are even potentially capable of using
the object's supernatural powers to cause harm to others.
Aesthetically,
the mask maker has usually been restricted in the forms he can use
since masks generally have a traditional imagery with formal
conventions. If they are not followed, the artist can bring upon
himself the severe censure of his social group and the displeasure or
even wrath of the spirit power inherent in the mask. This requirement
for accuracy, however, does not restrict artistic expressiveness.
The
mask maker can and does give his own creative interpretation to the
traditionally prescribed general forms, attributes, and devices. The
artist, in fact, is usually sought out as a maker of masks because of
his known ability to give a vitally expressive or an aesthetically
pleasing presentation of the required image.
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The Wearing Of Masks
- The wearer is
also considered to be in direct association with the spirit force of
the mask and is consequently exposed to like personal danger of being
affected by it. For his protection, the wearer, like the mask maker, is
required to follow certain sanctioned procedures in his use of the
mask. In some respects he plays the role of an actor in cooperation or
collaboration with the mask. Without his performing dance and posturing
routines, which are often accompanied with certain sounds of music, the
mask would remain a representation without a full life-force.
The
real drama and power of its form is the important contribution of the
wearer. When he is attired in the mask, there is a loss of his previous
identity and the assuming of a new one. Upon donning the mask, the
wearer sometimes undergoes a psychic change and as in a trance assumes
the spirit character depicted by the mask.
Usually, however, the
wearer skillfully becomes a “partner” of the character he is
impersonating, giving to the mask not only an important spark of
vitality by the light flashing from his own eyes but also bringing it
alive by his movements and poses. But it would seem that the wearer
often becomes psychologically completely attached to the character he
is helping to create. He loses his own identity and becomes like an
automaton, without his own will, which has become subservient to that
of the personage of the mask. It appears, however, that at all times
there remains some important, even if sub rosa, association between the
mask and its wearer.
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The Role Of The Spectator
- It is as
consecrated objects imbued with supernatural power that masks are
viewed by the spectators or participants at ceremonials where their
presence is required. Whatever their specific identity may be, the
masks usually refer back to early times, when their initial appearance
occurred. This basic aspect of the mask is understood at least in
essence by everyone. A paramount role of the mask is to give a sense of
continuity between the present and the beginnings of time, a sense that
is of vital importance for the integration of a culture with no written
history.
Psychologically the spectators become associated with
the past through the spirit power of the mask, and this often leads the
participants to a state of complete absorption or near-frenzy. This is
not, however, a consistent reaction to masked ceremonials. That depends
on the character whose presence the mask represents.
In some
cases, the spirit or supernatural being depicted is viewed with
rejoicing and almost a familiarity, which leads to gaiety that has a
cathartic aspect. Even so, the mask has a spirit content that is
respected and revered, even if it is not showing a being with malignant
potential. All of these forms have spirit and magical qualities and are
thus esteemed as agents for the accomplishing of superhuman acts.
Some
masks, however, do represent malignant, evil, or potentially harmful
spirits. These are often used to keep a required balance of power or a
traditional social and political relationship of inherited positions
within a culture. The characters depicted are also prescribed by
tradition and enact roles to achieve the desired ends.
The drama
involving these masks is often associated with secret societies,
especially in Africa, where the greatest range of mask forms and
functions can be observed. These forms are often used in very
restricted performances, where only select persons can view them. This
is also true in other areas where masks are used, such as in Oceania,
the Americas, and even in some of the folk mask rites still performed
in Europe.
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Meaning And Aesthetic Response
- On the basis
of present knowledge, it would appear that there is not or has not been
any set response or reaction by any one of the three groups involved
with the mask: the artist, the wearer, the spectator. There is,
however, a reaction of a very particular kind common to every culture,
a response such as awe, delight and pleasure, fear and even terror:
these are as traditionally determined as the forms and costumes of the
masks themselves. This is a learned and inherent pattern of conduct for
each culture.
Masks, therefore, that have a closely comparable
appearance in several unrelated groups in quite different parts of the
world often have totally dissimilar meanings and functions. It is thus
practically impossible to determine either the meaning or use of a mask
by its appearance alone. For example, some masks in Africa, as well as
in Oceania and East Asia, have such a grotesque or frightening
appearance as to lead one to suspect that they represent evil spirits
with an intent to terrorize the spectators; actually they may have the
opposite character and function.
The significance of masks can
be determined only by reference to accounts or personal observations of
the masks in the setting of their own culture.
The aesthetic
effects of masks, on the other hand, since they derive from the forms
and their disposition within the design, can readily be evaluated as
art objects. But this evaluation is based on elements very different
from those appraised within the mask's own culture. This is partly
because the total artistic qualities of a mask derive both from its
exterior forms and from its meaning and function within its cultural
context.
There exist, however, in all cultures criteria for
determining the quality of objects as art. These criteria differ from
one culture to another, and they may be known only from investigations
carried out within the varying cultures.
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Preservation And Collecting
- The
preservation or disposal of masks is often decreed by tradition. Many
masks and often their form and function are passed down through clans,
families, special societies, or from individual to individual. They are
usually spiritually reactivated or aesthetically restored by repainting
and redecorating, without destroying the basic form and symbolism. In
many instances, however, the mask is used only for one ceremony or
occasion and then is discarded or destroyed, sometimes by burning.
The
collecting of masks has largely been of recent origin. Not until the
late 19th and early 20th century were they seriously appreciated as art
objects or studied as cultural artifacts. Most masks have been obtained
through archaeological excavations or in field expeditions, that is, in
their place of origin.
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The Functions And Forms Of Masks
- Masks are as
extraordinarily varied in appearance as they are in function or
fundamental meaning. Many masks are primarily associated with
ceremonies that have religious and social significance or are concerned
with funerary customs, fertility rites, or curing sickness. Other masks
are used on festive occasions or to portray characters in a dramatic
performance and in re-enactments of mythological events. Masks are also
used for warfare and as protective devices in certain sports, as well
as frequently being employed as architectural ornament.
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Social And Religious Uses
- Masks
representing potentially harmful spirits were often used to keep a
required balance of power or a traditional relationship of inherited
positions within a culture. The forms of these masks invariably were
prescribed by tradition, as were their uses. This type of mask was
often associated with secret societies, especially in Africa, where the
greatest range of types and functions can be found. They were also
widely used among Oceanic peoples of the South Pacific and the American
Indians and are even used in some of the folk rites still performed in
Europe.
Masks have served an important role as a means of
discipline and have been used to admonish women, children, and
criminals. Common in China, Africa, Oceania, and North America,
admonitory masks usually completely cover the features of the wearer.
It is believed among some of the African Negro tribes that the first
mask was an admonitory one. A child, repeatedly told not to, persisted
in following its mother to fetch water. To frighten and discipline the
child, the mother painted a hideous face on the bottom of her water
gourd.
Others say the mask was invented by a secret African
society to escape recognition while punishing marauders. In New
Britain, members of a secret terroristic society called the Dukduk
appear in monstrous five-foot masks to police, to judge, and to execute
offenders. Aggressive supernatural spirits of an almost demonic nature
are represented by these masks, which are constructed from a variety of
materials, usually including tapa, or bark cloth, and the pith of
certain reeds. These materials are painted in brilliant colours, with
brick red and acid green predominating.
In many cultures
throughout the world, a judge wears a mask to protect him from future
recriminations. In this instance, the mask represents a traditionally
sanctioned spirit from the past who assumes responsibility for the
decision levied on the culprit.
Rituals, often nocturnal, by
members of secret societies wearing ancestor masks are reminders of the
ancient sanction of their conduct. In many cultures, these masked
ceremonials are intended to prevent miscreant acts and to maintain the
circumscribed activities of the tribe. Along the Guinea coast of West
Africa, for instance, many highly realistic masks represent ancestors
who enjoyed specific cultural roles; the masks symbolize sanction and
control when donned by the wearer.
Among some of the Dan and
Ngere tribes of Liberia and Ivory Coast, ancestor masks with generic
features act as intermediaries for the transmission of petitions or
offerings of respect to the gods. These traditional ancestral
emissaries exert by their spirit power a social control for the
community.
Particularly among Oceanic peoples, American Indians,
and Negro tribes of Africa, certain times of the year are set aside to
honour spirits or ancestors. Among nonliterate peoples who cannot
record their own histories, masked rituals act as an important link
between past and present, giving a sense of historic continuity that
strengthens their social bond. On these occasions, masks usually
recognizable as dead chieftains, relatives, friends, or even foes are
worn or exhibited. Gifts are made to the spirits incarnated in the
masks, while in other instances dancers wearing stylized mourning masks
perform the prescribed ceremony.
In western Melanesia, the
ancestral ceremonial mask occurs in a great variety of forms and
materials. The Sepik River area in north central New Guinea is the
source of an extremely rich array of these mask forms mostly carved in
wood, ranging from small faces to large fantastic forms with a variety
of appendages affixed to the wood, including shell, fiber, animal
skins, seed, flowers, and feathers. These masks are highly polychromed
with earth colours of red and yellow, lime white, and charcoal black.
They often represent supernatural spirits as well as ancestors and
therefore have both a religious and a social significance.
Members
of secret societies usually conduct the rituals of initiation, when a
young man is instructed in his future role as an adult and is
acquainted with the rules controlling the social stability of the
tribe. Totem and spiritualistic masks are donned by the elders at these
ceremonies. Sometimes the masks used are reserved only for initiations.
Among the most impressive of the initiation masks are the exquisitely
carved human faces of west coast African Negro tribes.
In
western and central Congo (Kinshasa), in Africa, large, colourful
helmetlike masks are used as a masquerading device when the youth
emerges from the initiation area and is introduced to the villagers as
an adult of the tribe. After a lengthy ordeal of teaching and
initiation rites, for instance, a youth of the Pende tribe appears in a
distinctive colourful mask indicative of his new role as an adult. The
mask is later cast aside and replaced by a small ivory duplicate, worn
as a charm against misfortune and as a symbol of his manhood.
Believing
everything in nature to possess a spirit, man found authority for
himself and his family by identifying with a specific nonhuman spirit.
He adopted an object of nature; then he mythologically traced his
ancestry back to the chosen object; he preempted the animal as the
emblem of himself and his clan. This is the practice of totem, which
consolidates family pride and distinguishes social lines. Masks are
made to house the totem spirit. The totem ancestor is believed actually
to materialize in its mask; thus masks are of the utmost importance in
securing protection and bringing comfort to the totem clan.
The
Papuans of New Guinea build mammoth masks called hevehe, attaining 20
feet in height. They are constructed of a palm wood armature covered in
bark cloth; geometric designs are stitched on with painted cane strips.
These fantastic man–animal masks are given a frightening aspect. When
they emerge from the men's secret clubhouse, they serve to protect the
members of the clan.
The so-called “totem” pole of the Alaskan
and British Columbian Indian fulfills the same function. The African
totem mask is often carved from ebony or other hard woods, designed
with graceful lines and showing a highly polished surface. Animal
masks, their features elongated and beautifully formalized, are common
in western Africa. Dried grass, woven palm fibers, coconuts, and
shells, as well as wood are employed in the masks of New Guinea, New
Ireland, and New Caledonia. Represented are fanciful birds, fishes, and
animals with distorted or exaggerated features.
The high priest
and medicine man, or the shaman, frequently had his own very powerful
totem, in whose mask he could exorcise evil spirits, punish enemies,
locate game or fish, predict the weather, and, most importantly, cure
disease.
The Northwest Coast Indians of North America in
particular devised mechanical masks with movable parts to reveal a
second face—generally a human image. Believing that the human spirit
could take animal form and vice versa, the makers of these masks fused
man and bird or man and animal into one mask. Some of these
articulating masks acted out entire legends as their parts moved.
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Funerary And Commemorative Uses
- In
cultures in which burial customs are important, anthropomorphic masks
have often been used in ceremonies associated with the dead and
departing spirits. Funerary masks were frequently used to cover the
face of the deceased. Generally their purpose was to represent the
features of the deceased, both to honour them and to establish a
relationship through the mask with the spirit world. Sometimes they
were used to force the spirit of the newly dead to depart for the
spirit world. Masks were also made to protect the deceased by
frightening away malevolent spirits.
From the Middle Kingdom (c.
2040–1786 BC) to the 1st century AD, the ancient Egyptians placed
stylized masks with generalized features on the faces of their dead.
The funerary mask served to guide the spirit of the deceased back to
its final resting place in the body. They were commonly made of cloth
covered with stucco or plaster, which was then painted. For more
important personages, silver and gold were used. Among the most
splendid examples of the burial portrait mask is the one created c.
1350 BC for the pharaoh Tutankhamen. In Mycenaean tombs of c. 1400 BC,
beaten gold portrait masks were found. Gold masks also were placed on
the faces of the dead kings of Cambodia and Siam.
The mummies of
Inca royalty wore golden masks. The mummies of lesser personages often
had masks that were made of wood or clay. Some of these ancient Andean
masks had movable parts, such as the metallic death mask with movable
ears that was found in the Moon Pyramid at Moche, Peru. The ancient
Mexicans made burial masks that seem to be generic representations
rather than portraits of individuals.
In ancient Roman burials,
a mask resembling the deceased was often placed over his face or was
worn by an actor hired to accompany the funerary cortege to the burial
site. In patrician families these masks or imagines were sometimes
preserved as ancestor portraits and were displayed on ceremonial
occasions. Such masks were usually modeled over the features of the
dead and cast in wax. This technique was revived in the making of
effigy masks for the royalty and nobility of Europe from the late
Middle Ages through the 18th century.
Painted and with human
hair, these masks were attached to a dummy dressed in state regalia and
were used for display, processionals, or commemorative ceremonials.
From the 17th century to the 20th, death masks of famous persons became
widespread among European peoples. With wax or liquid plaster of paris,
a negative cast of the human face could be produced that in turn acted
as a mold for the positive image, frequently cast in bronze. In the
19th century, life masks made in the same manner became popular.
Another
type of life mask had been produced in the Fayyum region of Egypt
during the 1st and 2nd centuries AD. These were realistic portraits
painted in encaustic on wood during a person's lifetime; when the
person died, they were attached directly to the facial area on the
mummy shroud.
The skull mask is another form usually associated
with funerary rites. The skull masks of the Aztecs, like their wooden
masks, were inlaid with mosaics of turquoise and lignite, and the eye
sockets were filled with pyrites. Holes were customarily drilled in the
back so the mask might be hung or possibly worn. In Melanesia, the
skull of the deceased is often modeled over with clay, or resin and
wax, and then elaborately painted with designs that had been used
ceremonially by the deceased during his own lifetime.
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Therapeutic Uses
- Masks have
played an important part in magico-religious rites to prevent and to
cure disease. In some cultures, the masked members of secret societies
could drive disease demons from entire villages and tribes. Among the
best known of these groups was the False Face Society of the North
American Iroquois Indians. These professional healers performed violent
pantomimes to exorcise the dreaded Gahadogoka gogosa (demons who
plagued the Iroquois). They wore grimacing, twisted masks, often with
long wigs of horsehair. Metallic inserts often were used around the
eyes to catch the light of the campfire and the moon, emphasizing the
grotesqueness of the mask.
Masks for protection from disease
include the measle masks worn by Chinese children and the cholera masks
worn during epidemics by the Chinese and Burmese. The disease mask is
most developed among the Sinhalese in Sri Lanka (Ceylon), where 19
distinct rakasa, or disease devil masks, have been devised. These masks
are of ferocious aspect, fanged, and with startling eyes. Gaudily
coloured and sometimes having articulating jaws, they present a
dragon-like appearance.
Masks have long been used in military
connections. A war mask will have a malevolent expression or hideously
fantastic features to instill fear in the enemy. The ancient Greeks and
Romans used battle shields with grotesque masks or attached terrifying
masks to their armour, as did the Chinese warrior. Grimacing menpo, or
mask helmets, were used by Japanese samurai.
Many sports require
the use of masks. Some of these are merely functional, protective
devices such as the masks worn by fencers, baseball catchers, or even
skiers. To protect their faces in sports events and tournaments of
arms, horsemen of the Roman army attached highly decorative and
symbolic masks to their helmets.
Perhaps the earliest use of
masks was in connection with hunting. Disguise masks were seemingly
used in the early Stone Age in stalking prey and later to house the
slain animal's spirit in the hope of placating it. The traditional
animal masks worn by the Altaic and Tungusic shamans in Siberia are
strictly close to such prehistoric examples as the image of the
so-called sorcerer in the Cave of Les Trois Frères in Ariège, France.
Since
agricultural societies first appeared in prehistory, the mask has been
widely used for fertility rituals. The Iroquois, for instance, used
corn husk masks at harvest rituals to give thanks for and to achieve
future abundance of crops. Perhaps the most renowned of the masked
fertility rites held by American Indians are those still performed by
the Hopi and Zuni Indians of the Southwest U.S. Together with masked
dancers representing clouds, rain spirits, stars, Earth Mother, sky
god, and others, the shaman takes part in elaborate ceremonies designed
to assure crop fertility.
Spirits called kachinas, who first
brought rain to the Pueblo tribes, are said to have left their masks
behind when sent to dwell in the bottom of a desert lake. Their return
to help bring the rain is incarnated by the masked dancer. Cylindrical
masks, covering the entire head and resting on the shoulders, are of a
primal type. They are made of leather and humanized by the addition of
hair and a variety of adjuncts. Eyes are represented by incisions or by
buckskin balls filled with deer hair and affixed to the mask. The nose
is often of rolled buckskin or corncob.
Frequently the mask has
a projecting wooden cylinder for a bill or a gourd stem cut with teeth
for a snout. Horns are attached to some masks. Many colours are used in
their painting; plumes and beads are attached, and the sex of the mask
is distinguished by its shape: round head indicates male and square
indicates female. In the western Sudan area of Africa many tribes have
masked fertility ceremonials. The segoni-kun masks that are fashioned
by the Bambara tribes in Mali are aesthetically among the most
interesting.
Antelopes, characterized by their elegant
simplicity, are carved in wood and affixed to woven fiber caps that are
hung with raffia and cover the wearer. The antelope is believed to have
introduced agriculture, and so when crops are sown, members of Tji-wara
society cavort in the fields in pairs to symbolize fertility and
abundance.
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Festive Uses
- Masks for
festive occasions are still commonly used in the 20th century.
Ludicrous, grotesque, or superficially horrible, festival masks are
usually conducive to good-natured license, release from inhibitions,
and ribaldry. These include the Halloween, Mardi Gras, or “masked ball”
variety. The disguise is assumed to create a momentary, amusing
character, often resulting in humorous confusions, or to achieve
anonymity for the prankster or ribald reveler.
Throughout
contemporary Europe and Latin America, masks are associated with folk
festivals, especially those generated by seasonal changes or marking
the beginning and end of the year. Among the most famous of the folk
masks are the masks worn to symbolize the driving away of winter in
parts of Austria and Switzerland. In Mexico and Guatemala, annual folk
festivals employ masks for storytelling and caricature, such as for the
Dance of the Old Men and the Dance of the Moors and the Christians. The
Eskimo make masks with comic or satiric features that are worn at
festivals of merrymaking, as do the Ibos of Nigeria.
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Theatrical Uses
- Masks have
been used almost universally to represent characters in theatrical
performances. Theatrical performances are a visual literature of a
transient, momentary kind. It is most impressive because it can be seen
as a reality; it expends itself by its very revelation. The mask
participates as a more enduring element, since its form is physical.
The
mask as a device for theatre first emerged in Western civilization from
the religious practices of ancient Greece. In the worship of Dionysus,
god of fecundity and the harvest, the communicants' attempt to
impersonate the deity by donning goatskins and by imbibing wine
eventually developed into the sophistication of masking. When a
literature of worship appeared, a disguise, which consisted of a white
linen mask hung over the face (a device supposedly initiated by
Thespis, a 6th-century-BC poet who is credited with originating
tragedy), enabled the leaders of the ceremony to make the god manifest.
Thus symbolically identified, the communicant was inspired to speak in
the first person, thereby giving birth to the art of drama.
In
Greece the progress from ritual to ritual-drama was continued in highly
formalized theatrical representations. Masks used in these productions
became elaborate headpieces made of leather or painted canvas and
depicted an extensive variety of personalities, ages, ranks, and
occupations. Heavily coiffured and of a size to enlarge the actor's
presence, the Greek mask seems to have been designed to throw the voice
by means of a built-in megaphone device and, by exaggeration of the
features, to make clear at a distance the precise nature of the
character.
Moreover, their use made it possible for the Greek
actors—who were limited by convention to three speakers for each
tragedy—to impersonate a number of different characters during the play
simply by changing masks and costumes. Details from frescoes, mosaics,
vase paintings, and fragments of stone sculpture that have survived to
the present day provide most of what is known of the appearance of
these ancient theatrical masks. The tendency of the early Greek and
Roman artists to idealize their subjects throws doubt, however, upon
the accuracy of these reproductions. In fact, some authorities maintain
that the masks of the ancient theatre were crude affairs with little
aesthetic appeal.
In the Middle Ages, masks were used in the
mystery plays of the 12th to the 16th century. In plays dramatizing
portions of the Old and New Testaments, grotesques of all sorts, such
as devils, demons, dragons, and personifications of the seven deadly
sins, were brought to stage life by the use of masks. Constructed of
papier-mâché, the masks of the mystery plays were evidently marvels of
ingenuity and craftsmanship, being made to articulate and to belch fire
and smoke from hidden contrivances. But again, no reliable pictorial
record has survived.
Masks used in connection with present-day
carnivals and Mardi Gras and those of folk demons and characters still
used by central European peasants, such as the Perchten masks of Alpine
Austria, are most likely the inheritors of the tradition of medieval
masks.
The 15th-century Renaissance in Italy witnessed the rise
of a theatrical phenomenon that spread rapidly to France, to Germany,
and to England, where it maintained its popularity into the 18th
century. Comedies improvised from scenarios based upon the domestic
dramas of the ancient Roman comic playwrights Plautus (254?–184 BC) and
Terence (186/185–159 BC) and upon situations drawn from anonymous
ancient Roman mimes flourished under the title of commedia dell'arte.
Adopting
the Roman stock figures and situations to their own usage's, the
players of the commedia were usually masked. Sometimes the masking was
grotesque and fanciful, but generally a heavy leather mask, full or
half face, disguised the commedia player. Excellent pictorial records
of both commedia costumes and masks exist; some sketches show the
characters of Arlecchino and Colombina wearing black masks covering
merely the eyes, from which the later masquerade mask is certainly a
development.
Except for vestiges of the commedia in the form of
puppet and marionette shows, the drama of masks all but disappeared in
Western theatre during the 18th, 19th, and first half of the 20th
centuries. In modern revivals of ancient Greek plays, masks have
occasionally been employed, and such highly symbolic plays as Die
versunkene Glocke (The Sunken Bell; 1897) by the German Gerhart
Hauptmann (1862–1946) and dramatizations of Alice in Wonderland have
required masks for the performers of grotesque or animal figures.
The
Irish poet-playwright W.B. Yeats (1865–1939) revived the convention in
his Dreaming of the Bones and in other plays patterned upon the
Japanese No drama. In 1926 theatre goers in the United States witnessed
a memorable use of masks in The Great God Brown by the American
dramatist Eugene O'Neill (1888–1953), wherein actors wore masks of
their own faces to indicate changes in the internal and external lives
of their characters. Oskar Schlemmer (1888–1943), a German artist
associated with the Bauhaus, became interested in the late 1920s and
'30s in semantic phenomenology as applied to the design of masks for
theatrical productions.
Modern art movements are often reflected
in the design of contemporary theatrical masks. The stylistic concepts
of Cubism and Surrealism, for example, are apparent in the masks
executed for a 1957 production of La favola del figlio cambiato (The
Fable of the Transformed Son) by the Italian dramatist Luigi Pirandello
(1867–1936). A well-known mid-century play using masks was Les Nègres
(1958; The Blacks, 1960) by the French writer Jean Genet. The mask,
however, has unquestionably lost its importance as a theatrical
convention in the 20th century, and its appearance in modern plays is
unusual.
In many ways akin to Greek drama in origin and theme,
the No drama of Japan has remained a significant part of national life
since its beginnings in the 14th century. No masks, of which there are
about 125 named varieties, are rigidly traditional and are classified
into five general types: old persons (male and female), gods,
goddesses, devils, and goblins. The material of the No mask is wood
with a coating of plaster, which is lacquered and gilded. Colours are
traditional.
White is used to characterize a corrupt ruler; red
signifies a righteous man; a black mask is worn by the villain, who
epitomizes violence and brutality. No masks are highly stylized and
generally characterized. They are exquisitely carved by highly
respected artists known as tenka-ichi, “the first under heaven.” Shades
of feeling are portrayed with beautifully sublimated realism. When the
masks are subtly moved by the player's hand or body motion, their
expression appears to change.
In Tibet, sacred dramas are
performed by masked lay actors. A play for exorcising demons called the
“Dance of the Red Tiger Devil” is performed at fixed seasons of the
year exclusively by the priests or lamas wearing awe-inspiring masks of
deities and demons. Masks employed in this mystery play are made of
papier-mâché, cloth, and occasionally gilt copper. In the Indian state
of Sikkim and in Bhutan, where wood is abundant and the damp climate is
destructive to paper, they are carved of durable wood. All masks of the
Himalayan peoples are fantastically painted and are usually provided
with wigs of yak tail in various colours. Formally they often emphasize
the hideous.
Masks, usually made of papier-mâché, are employed
in the religious or admonitory drama of China; but for the greater part
the actors in popular or secular drama make up their faces with
cosmetics and paint to resemble masks, as do the Kabuki actors in
Japan. The makeup mask both identifies the particular character and
conveys his personality. The highly didactic sacred drama of China is
performed with the actors wearing fanciful and grotesque masks. Akin to
this “morality” drama are the congratulatory playlets, pageants,
processions, and dances of China. Masks employed in these ceremonies
are highly ornamented, with jeweled and elaborately filigreed headgears.
In
the lion and dragon dances of both China and Japan, a stylized mask of
the beast is carried on a pole by itinerant players, whose bodies are
concealed by a dependent cloth. The mask and cloth are manipulated
violently, as if the animal were in pursuit, to the taps of a small
drum. The mask's lower jaw is movable and made to emit a loud
continuous clacking by means of a string.
On Java and Bali,
wooden masks, tupeng, are used in certain theatrical performances
called wayang wong. These dance dramas developed from the shadow puppet
plays of the 18th century and are performed not only as amusement but
as a safeguard against calamities. The stories are in part derived from
ancient Sanskrit literature, especially the Hindu epics, although the
Javanese later became Muslims.
The brightly painted masks are
made of wood and leather and are often fitted with horsehair and
metallic or gilded paper accoutrements. They are ordinarily held in the
teeth by means of a strap of leather or rattan that has been fastened
across the inside. Occasionally an actor interrupts the unseen
narrator, the Dalang, who is speaking the play. The mask is then held
in front of the face while the player says his line. The use of
theatrical masks in Java is exceptional, since masks, being forbidden
under the prohibition of images, are practically unknown in the Islamic
world.
In the 20th century, with the breaking down of primitive
and folk cultures, the mask has increasingly become a decorative
object, although it has long been used in art as an ornamental device.
In Haiti, India, Indonesia, Japan, Kenya, and Mexico, masks are
produced largely for tourists. The collecting of old masks has been a
part of the current interest in so-called primitive and folk arts.
Masks also have exerted a decided influence on modern art movements,
especially in the first decades of the 20th century, when painters in
France and Germany found a source of inspiration in the tribal masks of
Africa and western Oceania.
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Additional Reading
- “Masks” in the
Encyclopedia of World Art, vol. 9, col. 520–570 (1964), a good
historical survey; William N. Fenton, “Masked Medicine Societies of the
Iroquois,” Smithsonian Institution, Annual Report for 1940, pp. 397–429
(1941), a very good general discussion of Iroquois masks, with
illustrations; Marcel Griaule, Masques Dogons, 2nd ed. (1963), a
profusely illustrated classic study of the masks of the Dogon, a people
of Mali, within their cultural setting; George W. Harley, Masks as
Agents of Social Control in Northeast Liberia, Peabody Museum Papers
32, no. 2 (1950, reprinted 1975), a useful, illustrated article on this
topic; Edward A. Kennard, Hopi Kachinas, 2nd ed. (1971), an important
study; Dorothy J. Ray, Eskimo Masks: Art and Ceremony (1967), one of
the best studies of Eskimo masks, with many fine plates and a
bibliography; F.E. Williams, Drama of Orokolo (1940, reprinted 1969), a
classic study of masks of the Gulf of Papua, New Guinea, with fine
illustrations and a bibliography; Malcolm Kirk, Man as Art: New Guinea
(1981), with especially good photographs; Donald B. Cordry, Mexican
Masks (1980), a study of how Mexican masks are related to both the
European and the Indian traditions; Simon Ottenberg, Masked Rituals of
Afikpo (1975), a survey of a Nigerian masquerade tradition; and Leon
Underwood, Masks of West Africa (1948), a small book but important for
the subject, with good plates. Paul S. Wingert
“Reproduced with permission from the Encyclopaedia Britannica @ 1998-2000 Britannica.com Inc. All rights reserved.”
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