Senufo masks combine features of animals and humans in a single design. The Senufo artists have a high status in their society as their masks and sculptures are believed to have the power to help communication between the living and their dead ancestors.

2025年1月28日 · Miniature, easily portable masks, representing and sharing in the power of the larger masks, protect the owner when he is away from home. The carvers also produce the large anthropomorphic rice ladles used to designate the most hospitable woman of a lineage during the harvest feast; chiefs’ staffs; and female figures that seem to be prestige ...

The Kponyungo, also known as the “funeral head mask” or “Firespitter,” is the most well-known Senufo mask. The name Kponyungo is derived from the words “ kpoo ” and “ nyungo ”, which translates to “the head of the deceased one”.

2023年8月25日 · The helmet masks featured here, alternatively called firespitters or, in Senufo vernacular, kponyugu, are worn by initiated members of the Senufo’s poro or lô society on several occasions but especially at funerals to help the deceased’s spirit to pass on to the realm of the ancestors without issue. This post looks closely at the purpose ...

Throughout the twentieth century, members of poro, a Senufo initiation association, wore small, finely carved face masks as insignia. The masks, known as kpeliye'e, feature delicate oval faces with geometric projections at the sides.

Zoomorphic helmet masks like the one seen here are worn by members of the all-male Senufo association known as Poro, during funerals of important elders and other ceremonies. These prestigious and powerful masks are visual statements that acknowledge the reality of evil while simultaneously offering a means to control it.

The kpelie is always worn by men, but it combines the features of an ideal woman and an animal, such as an antelope, ram, or hornbill (as here), along with fertility symbols, such as palm nuts. The scarification marks represent the Senufo ideal of female beauty.

Throughout the twentieth century, male performers wore raffia-fringed face masks, capes, and full-body outfits to entertain audiences at funerals, commemorative ceremonies, and other events in Senufo communities. Masqueraders' feminine dance movements pay homage to the importance of women.

The zoomorphic wanyugo masks, characterised by their aggressive appearance – crocodile or hyena jaw, warthog tusks – are perceived by the Senufo as violent masks, whose powers are employed either on behalf of the Poro initiation society to maintain social order, or with more limited associations as part

Read more information about Senufo carvers and their Kpelié masks and Tugubele statues in the tribal art blog