A superb ancient female pwo dance mask (or mwana pwo for a y - Lot 76

A superb ancient female pwo dance mask (or mwana pwo for a young woman), embodying the idealized beauty of women, and displaying all the ancient attributes of beauty in Tchokwe country: traditional tattoos on the face, including the famous cross-shaped cingelyengelye motif engraved on the forehead, and dental mutilations. He still wears his headdress in the form of a headband with multiple curls characteristic of ancient pwo masks, enriched with jewels, and has also retained his woven cotton net for the mask wearer. Ancient pwo masks such as this one may have served an important fertility cult linked to spiritual entities called mahamba, and their incarnation in these masks could be identified as a cause of illness if they were neglected or not danced regularly enough. Always worn by a male dancer, but embodying feminine beauty, the pwo or mwana pwo mask contributed to the fertility of spectators. Published in 1974 by Hélène and Philippe Leloup, and exhibited on several occasions, notably during the major Fleuve Congo exhibition at the Musée du Quai Branly, the pwo mask from the Leloup collection is undoubtedly one of the finest examples of the corpus still in private hands. See p.104-107 on pwo and mahamba masks in: Petridis, Art and Power, Cleveland, 2009 Tchokwe, Angola, late 19th/early 20th century Wood, pigments, plant fibers, leather, metal, cowries, glass beads, a small scratch under the left eye, old erosions and very fine patina. Height: 35cm Provenance: Hélène Leloup Collection, Paris Hélène Leloup Collection, Paris Passed on by descent Exhibitions and Publications: Wihélem, "Les arts primitifs chez l'antiquaire, à Paris et en Belgique" in Plaisir de France, vol. 40 , n°416, 1974, p.59, n°9 Primitifs, n°4, May-June 1991, p.9 Bouttiaux and Kouoh, David Adjaye's GEO-Graphics: a Map of Art Practices in Africa Past and Present , BOZAR Centre for Fine Arts, Brussels, June 9 - September 26, 2010, p.273 Congo River. Arts d'Afrique centrale: correspondances et mutations des formes, Musée du quai Branly - Jacques Chirac, Paris, June 22 - October 3 2010, p.346, n°230