Old big round mask

Q: I’m totally ignorant about masks, but my father found this in a garage here in Italy and now I would like some informations about it. I looked into your website for similar masks, but I haven’t found anything identical. Can you please tell me from which part of the world it comes? The dimensions are 60×50 (cm) and it’s made of wood.  Alexandru, 584

A: Being the Mask Man is a humbling experience. Often I’m confronted with masks that are complete strangers to me. Though unrecognizable, they usually appear to be made for sale to tourists. Not this one. It  could be old and real– but from where? 55 cm in diameter is very big! It is carved out on the back and has some depth. My guess is it’s an early Odo Ntease from the Akan people of Ghana. The African_Arts group on Yahoo might be able to confirm this. B