Baga-mask
Price NOT AVAILABLE information
request of availability or comment - send email
Laurent van Ham, (1947-1995, May)
Dealer. Rotterdam-The Netherlands. Travelled and collected objects for many
years in Africa, organised exhibitions in The Netherlands and “made” many
new collectors. Co-author: Discovering the Forgotten "Civilization"
of Komoland, Northern Ghana. Netherlands, 1985.
( © Who is Who in African Art, Guy van Rijn)
Baga-mask information request of availability or comment
- send email
Price 4,000 €
About
the BAGA - GUINEA BISSAU
The
Baga people live along the coast of Guinnea Bissau where they number about
45,000. They live in villages divided into two and four quarters, which
are in turn divided into five or six clans. Traditionally , each village
was governed by the eldest member of each clan, who met in secret to discuss
tribal matters. More recently, this system has been replaced, and each
village is now headed by an elected 'mayor'.
The
Baga are a farming community, cultivating primarily rice in wet patties along
the coast. Cotton, gourds, millet, oil palms, okra, sesame and sorghum are other
locally grown commodities.
The
Baga also have the belief that abundance can be encouraged by placing benevolent
spirits embodied in carved wooden figures in specially constructed huts between
the village and the bush. Some coastal fihing is also undertaken and play
san important role in the Baga economy.
Spiritually,
the Baga believe in a single god, Kanu,
who is assisted by Somtop,
a male spirit and by A-Bol,
a female spirit. Below them, the spirit, A-mantsho-nga-Tshol,
who is often represented as a snake, serves as the patron of the two
lowest grades of the To-lom society which overseas the different initiation
ceremonies,
The
Baga are famous for their Nimba headdress, known to the Baga as d'emba.
A shoulder mask, standing on four legs, it has a pair of large breasts, enlarged
head, u-shaped ears, and is work by dancers during festivals and ceremonies
relating to births, marriages, harvest ceremonies and some other joyous
celebrations. It is said to represent a woman who has born children, and to
symbolize fertility.
The
Baga snake headdresses or Bansonyi,
representing the spirit A-mantsho-nga-Tshol,
(master of medicine) sometime measuring up to 10 feet high and typically
display a rearing snake, polychrome decoration and eyes. Two or sometimes
more dancers, clad in raffia costumes or textiles and palm frowns, with the
assistance of light framework decorated with feathers, ribbons and
bells would support these headdresses on their shoulders or heads.
The
masked figures representing the sections of the village would face one another,
and, urged on by spectators, they open the ceremony with amok battle intended to
inspire the village unity.
Among
most Baga subgroups, only adolescent males learn the secrets of the
snake-spirit, during the Ka-Bere-Tshol initiation which marks the passage to
adult status. The Bansonyi had a variety of functions. Beside appearing at
funerals, they detect destructive forces, cure sterility, protect boys at
circumcision and end droughts.
A-Tshol
(
meaning medicine) figures, or as sometimes
called, elek
figures were used principally as shrine figures, but sometime also as
headdresses. These figures took the form of a head with an exceptionally
long beak and a long neck inserted into a base structure. The head also
has anthropomorphic aspects such as a coiffure, ears, forehead and nose.
A-Tshol
figures were placed in the young man's sacred grove as a guardian during
initiation, a time when they were considered to be susceptible to destructive
forces as during these initiation ceremonies, a trance like state was often
entered. A T-shol
was under the control of the oldest member of the family as a symbolic
incarnation of the lineage.
This
Baga Bird Headdress, or a-Bamp
headdress as the Baga call it, is very popular among the young initiates and
boys. Typical form of these bird statues are a long neck and beak, body
with chest protruding, broad wings, they often are sculpted with two birds on
their backs, a house and sometimes a snake. It is intricately carved and
colored with pigment in abstract lines and checkerboard.
The a-Bemp
dance performed by the masquerader is full of vigor, crouching and again
leaping up, tilting the headdress from left to right, all done to the rhythm of
men beating on slit gongs and drums. It is generally a nocturnal dance,
and the masquerader is followed by an initiate hold a flame torch.
The Tonkongba
mask of the Baga are usually kept in front of the clan's shrine. It
is sometimes worn by masqueraders during ceremonies involving sacrifices, such
as funerals.
It is
believed that Tonkongba
has the power to know both good and bad news.
Baga-mask information request of availability or comment
- send email
Reference:
Africa:
The Art of a Continent - Tom Phillips. ISBN:3-7913-2004-1
African
Masks: Barbier-Mueller Collection. ISBN: 3-7913-2709-7
Art
of the Baga: A Drama of Cultural Reinvention - Frederik Lamp. ISBN:3791317253
Tribal
Arts of African - Jaques-Baptiste Baquart. ISBN: 0-500-28231-5
+32
3 227.35.40
Meet
David Norden at NYC Tribal Art Show 2012 in May