IDNO

LS.52054.GIJ

Description

A Lughulu comic male face mask. The mask is wooden and square in shape with an overly exaggerated high rounded forehead, square bulbous eyes, rectangular shaped nose between the eyes, and protruding mouth with a slit; the cheeks are rounded, swollen and puffy. The mask is placed on a woven raffia cloth.

Place

W Africa; Nigeria; Eastern Nigeria; Northern Bende division

Cultural Affliation

Item

Named Person

Photographer

Jones, Gwilliam Iwan (known as G.I.)

Collector / Expedition

Date

circa 1930 - 1939

Collection Name

Jones Collection

Source

Jones, Gwilliam Iwan (known as G.I.)

Format

Lantern Slide Black & White

Primary Documentation

Other Information

LS.52051.GIJ to LS.52057.GIJ were found with the piece of paper now numbered C247/4/ which was in wooden box formerly numbered 22. It has now been renumbered C247/ by the cataloguer.

The inscription on the box as well as a descriptive list of slides pasted on the inside lid of the box indicates that it originally contained lantern slides from the Fens and belonged to D.G. Reid.

However, the lantern slides are attributed to G.I. Jones because the handwriting on the papers found inside wooden box C246/ is similar to the handwriting on the papers found inside wooden box C247/.

Publication: Same mask is shown in Jones, 1973, p.60, Figure 4; the caption reads "Comic Mask from Lughulu Maskerade. Item Tribe, Ishu-Item, Ibo.

Context: The Item and Alayi tribes had their own particular masquerades called Lughulu. The characters wore masks, not heads, and these were of two kinds: beautiful, which were female, sometimes white-faced, sometimes stained a reddish brown colour with cam wood: and ugly, which were either white-faced or stained black, and were considered comic rather than fierce. These masks were sometimes full-sized but often, like some Ogoni masks, were small and designed to cover only the upper portion of the actor’s face, leaving his mouth and jaw exposed (Jones, 1984, p.206) In describing the style of this Lughulu mask Jones writes that it conforms to a stylized mode which converts the salient features to geometrical forms (Jones, 1973, p.60).

Context: Cole and Aniakor write, "In Item and Ugweke, for example, a series of fine masks are danced in a ‘play’ called Lughulu that includes the familiar opposition of pretty females and ugly males but almost nothing is known about the cult." (Cole and Aniakor, 1989, p. 166).

Bibliographical Reference:
Jones, G.I. 1973 "Sculpture of the Umuahia Area of Nigeria", in African Arts, Vol. 6, No.4, pp.58-63+96.
Jones, G.I., 1984. The Art of Eastern Nigeria (Cambridge University Press)
Cole, H. & C. Aniakor, 1984. Igbo Arts: Community and Cosmos (Museum of Cultural History, University of California)

This catalogue record has been updated with the support of the Getty Grant Program Two. [Alicia Fentiman 18/3/2008]