Title o f Artwork: African Mask with Plume
medium: Oil/canvas
price : $800
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This painting is one of a series of paintings which were done in the years 1999 – 2001, which I have called my “mask” period. I was inspired to paint them having always been fascinated by African masks ever since my parents bought a rather cheap one from a local African market and hung it on the back of the toilet door. Whether it was to frighten away evil spirits or meant as a decoration, little did they realise what an impression this made on my young mind. In fact I felt fairly terrified to visit the toilet in the night as I always imagined a sort of evil red glow coming through it’s hollow black eyes as I performed. As a result I became adept at the art of the quick pee but would rather hold the rest in till the morning cast a more favourable light on the subject!
The African tribe from which this image is “borrowed” is the “Mahongue” from Gabon.
Without delving too deeply into the significance of masks, suffice it to say that masks in Africa are used for a religio-magico-social rituals. This is rather trivialising the meaning but is a general overall view. When the mask-wearer attained a certain transcendent state, preternatural, life-giving forces were invoked to further the increase of human beings, animals, and the earth through its climatic or seasonal cycles. They were also used to guide a person through his life crises or rites of passage.
Earlier in the African’s social development, ritual behaviour itself involved a spontaneous outburst or release of inner stress. Only later did these rituals take on a creative edge and then decorations, bodily piercings, masks etc, were created for this purpose. The essential significance of the mask, lies in the fact that formless, invisible archetypes of human existence perceived as coming from invisible powers, acquired form.I personally like the idea that the African considers these objects and symbols of ritual to be embodiments of supernatural powers and to be imbued with a secret life of their own. As with all authentic works of art, they were born in a style which was “unaware of itself” (Ladislas Segy….. “Masks of Black Africa”.
In this particular painting, I have tried to express the current conflict raging in Africa about the “evils of imperialism, colonialism etc” that much of Black politicking is about. I have tried to portray a way in which Western European idea of culture (as depicted by the 14century French plume arising out of the back of the mask) and the African idea of culture can merge and compliment each other. The black spiky tree-like image in the top left of the frame represents the mining of African resources, particularly by the Belgians in the Belgian Congo of the early 19th Century. However the land is covered by a rainbow depicting the “rainbow nation” _ the phrase that Nelson Mandela coined when the Apartheid system ceased in early 1990’s in South Africa.
The blue hand appearing at the left hand frame is a bit of a visual cliche – ie. “the buck stops here.” This is a cry to the politicians of African to embrace the reality that they live in a global context – the world is a shared resource, full of multi-hued people of all cultures, races and societies, and that no one is dominant over any other. (this is my own ideal) What you give out you get back, karma etc… and it is time for each individual nation to take responsibility for its actions if the planet as a whole is to survive. The image of the buck itself represents the fragility and vulnerability of nature as a whole at this time. The orange and yellow protea- like image in the bottom-right of the frame represents hope for the future – a blossoming, a Renaissance, a rebirth of a new forward-looking culture in Africa-one that does not hanker after the glory days of the revolution, but puts its mind into building a solid new citizenry, based on care and respect for all people, cultures and the earth.
