Mask - Nigeria (No reserve price)

naturalistic type, associated with funeral rites, it offers a face coated with white clay marked by traditional vertical keloid scars, also present among the Igbo, with prominent cheekbones beneath broad eye sockets, and a carved dentition. A locally brushed light patina, with black and red ochre highlights. The Idoma settled at the confluence of the Benue and Niger. Numbering around 500,000, they are farmers and traders. The neighborhood and thus the influences of the Igbo, those of the Cross River and Igala peoples, have generated stylistic borrowings and great tribal similarities. The royal lineage members of their oglinye society, glorifying courage, use masks and headdresses during funerals and festivities. They also produce fertility statues with whitened faces and displaying incised teeth. The janiform headdresses are generally displayed at the funerals of notable people. Members of the male Kwompten society, for their part, used statues called goemai in healing rituals.