Masque, Yoruba, Nigeria

Collection Jos Hessel, Paris
Collection Marius-Ary Leblond, Vincennes
Charles Ratton, Paris
Alain Schoffel, Paris
Collection privée

Paris, Pavillon Marsan, Sculptures Africaines et Océaniennes, octobre 1923

Clouzot & Level, Sculptures Africaines et Océaniennes, 1923, pl. XXXIX

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Jos Hessel (1859–1942), cousin de Josse et de Gaston Bernheim, dont il dirigea la galerie dans les années 1900, compte parmi les premiers collectionneurs d'art africain. Il découvre l'art Nègre dès 1905, en même temps que les artistes modernes, dont lui et sa femme Lucie étaient très proches. En 1923, lorsque Clouzot et Level organisent au Pavillon de Marsan l'exposition Sculptures africaines et Océaniennes, rassemblant pour la première fois à Paris, dans un musée d'art "une ample collection d'oeuvres et spécialement de sculptures anciennes, offrant au public une large documentation sur l'art des Noirs et l'art Océanien" (Clouzot et Level, 1923, p. 3), cinq sculptures reproduites au catalogue - dont ce masque - proviennent de la collection Hessel.

Tandis que les masques-heaumes interviennent dans le cadre du festival Efe-Gelede dont le but est de rendre hommage au pouvoir mystique des femmes, les masques faciaux – infiniment plus rares – sont liés, en pays Yoruba, et plus précisément dans l’Empire d’Oyo, au festival Odun Egungun, dédié aux ancêtres. C’est durant ces performances rituelles « et à l’occasion des rites funéraires commémorant les défunts, que les morts vivants apparaissent et qu’ils sont honorés à travers la médiation des mascarades, ou egungun ("conciliation des pouvoirs") » (Drewal, Pemberton et Abiodun, 1989, p. 175).

Ce très rare masque egungun – probablement le plus ancien connu – évoque dans la force et l’harmonie de ses traits, la dignité et la beauté éternelle de l'ancêtre défunt.


Yoruba mask, Nigeria

Jos Hessel (1859-1942), a cousin of Josse and Gaston Bernheim, whose gallery he ran in the 1900s, was one of the first collectors of African art. He discovered Negro art in 1905, along with modern artists, whom he and his wife Lucy were very close to.  In 1923, when Clouzot and Level organised the Pavillon de Marsan exhibition Sculptures africaines et Océaniennes (African and Oceanic sculpture), bringing together for the first time in Paris and in an art gallery "a large collection of works, and especially of ancient sculptures, thus providing the public with broader documentation on the art of the Blacks and Oceanic art" (Clouzot and Level, 1923, p. 3), five sculptures reproduced in the catalogue - including this mask - come from the Hessel Collection.

Whereas the helmet-masks came out for the Efe-Gelede festival whose purpose it was to pay homage to the mystical power of women, - the infinitely rarer - face masks are linked, in Yoruba country, and more specifically in the Oyo Empire, to the Odun Egungun festival, dedicated to ancestors. It was during such ritual performances "and during funerary rites commemorating the dead, that the living dead appeared and were honoured through the mediation of masquerades, or egungun ("propitiating the powers") " (Drewal, Pemberton and Abiodun, 1989, p. 175).

This very rare egungun mask - probably the earliest known one - evokes through the strength and harmony of its features, the dignity and eternal beauty of the deceased ancestor.