A Superb Guro Mask, Ivory Coast

Gu is a cult venerating a facetious, rowdy, and undisciplined spirit amongst the Guro. As Anne-Marie Bouttiaux (2005: 143) underlines, even if gu masks have a woman’s face, they don’t necessarily represent a female spirit. When danced, the behaviour is unpredictable and nothing in its dance is graceful or elegant. Masks of this type are exceptionally rare and were the object of regular blood sacrifices (ibid.: 136) which caused the multilayered glossy patina on this example.

The features of the Stanoff mask in particular, the bulging forehead surmounted by a deeply recessed, jagged hairline, the sloping slit eyes with a thin opening, the long slender nose and the small bulging mouth with the subtle smile, closely resemble the work of the Master of Buafle, a famous artist active prior to 1920 in the southeastern part of the Guro territory, close to the Yaure border. For a discussion of his style and comparable works cf. Fischer and Homberger (1985: 40, fig. 35; 43-44 with figs. 40-41; 94-95, pls. 16-17). However, the form and the position of the ears, especially the absence of the tragus which is always present in works by the Buafle master, suggest that the Stanoff mask is rather by an artist from his circle than by the master himself.