The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 13, 2025

Mask (Emangungu)

possibly early 1900s

Africa, Central Africa, Democratic Republic of Congo, Bembe-style maker

Wood, kaolin, colorant, and iron
Overall: 46 cm (18 1/8 in.)
Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund 2006.116
Location: 108A African

Did You Know?

White kaolin clay highlights the eyes of this carved wooden mask.

Description

Among the Bembe, anthropo-zoomorphic plank masks are used in circumcision rites called butende. They are worn along with a costume of bark and banana leaves by the initiated boys who beg for food in the village while living in seclusion in the forest. The sculpture’s short projections above the forehead are identified as an owl’s tufts. The two pairs of eyes could refer to divination.
  • by 1957–?
    Franyo and Gustave Schindler, New York, NY
    before 1967–1990
    Jacques Boussard, Paris, France
    1990–?
    Lucien Van de Velde, Antwerp, Belgium
    private collection, Belgium
    2006
    (Sotheby's, New York, NY, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art)
    2006–
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • Herreman, Frank, Constantijn Petridis, Dick Beaulieux, Etnografisch Museum (Antwerp, Belgium), and National Museum of African Art (U.S.). 1993. Face of the Spirits : Masks from the Zaire Basin. Gent: Snoeck-Ducaju.
    Arts d'Afrique et d'Océanie, exh. cat., Palais Miramar, Cannes (Cannes: Palais Miramar, 1957), fig. 282. Arts primitifs dans les ateliers d'artistes, exh. cat., Musée de l'Homme, Paris (Paris: Musée de l'Homme, 1967), fig. 98.
    Michel Leiris and Jacqueline Delange, Afrique noire: Univers des formes (Paris: Gallimard, 1967), fig. 241.
    René Wassing, L'art d'Afrique noire (Fribourg: Office du Livre, 1969), fig. 41; Arts Primitifs: AfriqueOcéanie, sale cat. (Drouot-Montaigne, Paris, December 18, 1990), lot 17.
    Alisa LaGamma, Review of the exhibition "Face of the Spirits," African Arts, vol. 27, 1995, no. 1, p. 84.
    Petridis, Constantine. 2011. “New Acquisitions of African Art at the Cleveland Museum of Art.” African Arts. (44) No. 1, Spring 2011. Pg. 60, Fig. 7
    Cleveland Museum of Art. The CMA Companion: A Guide to the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2014. Mentioned and reproduced: P. 37
  • {{cite web|title=Mask (Emangungu)|url=false|author=|year=possibly early 1900s|access-date=13 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2006.116