African Arts Gallery

Yaka handle mask (N° 18573)

This northern Yaka mask, which has a handle, is capped with a basket cap, which is draped in a textile where colorful decorative motifs partially flake. The face is cemented with a red ochre border including the ears and nostrils. The parallel lines drawn on the cheeks are the tears of the initiates. The Zombo also used similar masks sculpted by the Yaka. Insiders could wear these single-platform masks that appeared in pairs. Height on a base: 59 cm.
Locally abraded polychrome
As initiation songs accompanied the appearance of the African Yaka mask, which incorporates the category of high-ranking masks thanks to its tiered headdress. Their design aroused the creativity of the sculptors whom the chefs rewarded for their talent. Hierarchical and authoritarian, composed of fearsome warriors, Yaka society was governed by lineage leaders with the right to life and death over their subjects. Hunting and the resulting prestige are an opportunity for the Yaka today to invoke ancestors and to resort to rituals using charms related to the institution .Khosi. The initiation society of young people is the n-khanda, found among the Eastern Kongo (Chokwe, Luba, etc.), and which uses various charms and masks in order to ensure a vigorous lineage.
(C.M.Faïk-Nzuji, The Power of the Sacred ; Yaka , Arthur P.Bourgeois)