African Arts Gallery

Ex-French collection of African art African mask Kwele Pipibuze, Pibibuze, ("the man") symbolizing the light and clairvoyance required to fight against the forces of witchcraft. The different versions of this mask refer to the antelope or duinker, the main game of the Kwele region. Kwele masks were not always intended to be worn, but to decorate the walls of huts. Abraded matte patina. Erosions and small accidents.
Depending on the presence of horns and their arrangement, the masks are called pibibudzé, Ekuku zokou, etc... and are associated with the ancestors or spirits of the forest, "ekuk". A tribe of the Kota group, the Kwélé, Bakwélé, live in the forest on the northern border of the Republic of Congo. They live from hunting, agriculture and metallurgy. Practicing the cult called Bwété borrowed from the Ngwyes, which was accompanied by obligatory initiation rites, they used at the end of the ceremonies in addition to the zoomorphic masks of elephant or gorilla, the ekuk masks evoking the antelope whose horns join in a loop under the chin. The blood of the antelope was also used among the Kwélé for therapeutic purposes.