SMILING TOMA LUANDO MASK

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T OM A LUANDO MASK SIERRA LEON CONDITION IS EXCELLENT GREAT PATINA, WOOD 16 " TALL, C.1980 GOOD INTERIOR WEAR. Toma people number 200,000 and leave in the high-altitude rain forest lying across the border between Guinea and Liberia . The largest known Toma mask was 1.82 m in height. Its frightening image represented the major forest spirit which made manifest the power of poro; one of its duties was symbolically to devour boys during initiation in order to give them rebirth as men. Only men wore these masks, which were fitted over the wearer's head horizontally. Masks of smaller dimensions are identified as the wife of the great forest spirit and, lacking the extended maul, seem less threatening. It is worn directly over the male wearer's face. The upper part usually exhibits simplified (cattle or antelope) horn shapes and a rounded forehead overhanging a short, abstractly shaped nose and large, flat facial planes. These brooding, often quite large, masks represent a forest spirit, Landai. They were used by the men's Poro Society to initiate boys into manhood. The masks, in what was often a frightening ritual for the boys, would symbolically swallow the boy, who would then re-emerge as a man. The masks were worn with a large raffia costume. Most have a flat face, the traditional beaked nose, jaws of teeth, protruding brow and read more

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