African Masking Traditions lecture by Bolaji Campbell

African Masking Traditions —Meaning, Motif and History

Wednesday, February 25, 5:30 p.m.

at the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology at Manning Hall, Main Green, Brown University

Bolaji Campbell (Department of Art and Architectural History, RISD) will discuss African Masking Traditions.

To behold the mask is to encounter the mysterious, the wonderful, and the fearful. The mask is the mediating force at that delicate intersection between the real and the imagined; the concrete and the imperceptible; the serious and the playful; the whimsical and the terrifying; the living and the dead. This multisensorial tradition shapes ways the tangible world of the living and the invincible realm of the departed are perceived, re-envisioned and understood.

Reception follows at our gallery in Manning Hall.