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Female mask, Didagur, early 20th century
Basketry made from the stem of lygodium (a climbing vine), cane, pigment
68 x 29 x 53 cm (26 3/4 x 11 7/16 x 20 7/8 in.)
The Marcia and John Friede Collection, a Promised Gift to the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco L05.1.187

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Artist Biography: (none) PROVENANCE: Jolika Collection of New Guinea Art PUBLICATIONS: 2005 - "Collected with pl. 283. This pair of didagur dance masks is rare and of exceptional age and quality. The crest on top, similar to that on pl. 283, is missing here. The design on the lower lip represents the spider web. A female mask of equal quality is in the collection of the Vatican Museum, but there is no male (Kaeppler, Kaufmann, and Newton, 1997, fig. 867). For other examples of female masks, collected among the Yimam, see Haberland and Seyfarth, 1974, fig. 18, nos. 1-3. Father Kirschbaum, in his notes on the collection he presented to the Vatican Museums in 1932, indicated that such masks "were made exclusively by the Kapriman and Kaningara peoples, [but] they were used as well by neighboring tribes, who either traded for or stole them" (Penkowski, 1982: 240). This may explain the presence of this type of mask among the Yimam. They were also "exported to the Iatmul through exchange" (Kaufmann, 1997: 580) and may be seen as "manifestations of spirit beings...[that] live in water or in hollow trees" (Kocher Schmid in Greub, 1985: 198, fig. 120). (Catalog #282, New Guinea Art: Masterpieces from the Jolika Collection of Marcia and John Friede, 2005, Volume 2, p. 128.) 1995 - Meyer, 1995, fig. 272.

Related Keywords
Didagur mask Female Francisco San Museums Arts Fine Gift Promised Friede John Marcia Art Jolika speakers language area village Kapriman Oceania Province Sepik East Guinea New object Ritual pigment cane vine climbing lygodium stem made Basketry 0709200406050494 A361102 L05.1.187 AOA