MasksoftheWorld.com is a good place to start. We know something about masquerade all over each of the world’s continents. We also include masks for Halloween, protection, protest, fetishes and more. We deal with everything that goes on the face that is dry rather than viscous.
But does that make us experts? No. The real experts specialize in certain continents of the world or specific countries
or cultures. These specialists (sometimes called “tribal art dealers”) can tell you way more about a mask than we can… and MOTW does occasionally make mistakes. About 2 weeks ago I confused a water spirit mask from one culture in West Africa with a fire spitter from another. But it’s good to start with us.
So let’s look at these three masks. I might think the first one is from the Indonesian area, the second one from somewhere in the Americas, and the third from the Middle Hills region of Nepal. This would be wrong. All three are Nyau masks from the Chewa culture in Malawi, East Africa. Check out the Chewa. They are an amazing group.
I could be wrong. Google also can make mistakes. Don’t hesitate to make a comment on our accuracy.
One Comment
Eric
The first two are Chewa but the third is a Sukuma mask.