Helmet Mask (Sowei)

Early to mid-20th century

Sherbro or Mende
Sierra Leone
Coastal West Africa

Until Sierra Leone was affected by a brutal civil war lasting from 1991 to 2002, helmet masks like the one displayed here were governed by the Sande association. Common among the related Sherbro and Mende peoples, this all-female group held important religious, political, and educational responsibilities. Masks with elaborate hairstyles, exemplifying local ideals of beauty, were performed by senior Sande officials at funerals, for visits of important guests, and during the initiation of young women into the association. This is one of the rare instances in Africa when women danced with sculpted masks.

Status: On View, Gallery 137
Department: Arts of Africa

Culture: Sherbro
Title: Helmet Mask (Sowei)
Place: Sierra Leone (Object made in)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1900–1950
Medium: Wood
Dimensions: 48.3 × 24.8 × 26.7 cm (19 × 9 3/4 × 10 1/2 in.)
Credit Line: The Art Institute of Chicago, Through prior acquisitions of the George F. Harding Collection, Mr. and Mrs. Herbert R. Molner, and the Ada Turnbull Hertle Endowment
Reference Number: 1997.361

Frans M. Olbrechts, forward. Art of Primitive Peoples, exh. cat., London, Berkeley Galleries, 1946), no. 12a (ill.).
George Nelson Preston, The Innovative African Sculptor, ex. cat. (Ithaca, New York, Ithaca College Museum of Art), no. 4 (ill.).
René A. Bravmann, African Islam (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1983), pp. 43, fig. 28 (ill.).
Stefan Eisenhofer, African Art (Taschen, Back to Visual Basics series, 2010), pp. 28-29 (ill.).
Constantine Petridis et al., Speaking of Objects: African Art at the Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2020), cat. no. 22, pp. 76-77 (ill.).
Constantine Petridis, “Making Objects Speak at the Art Institute of Chicago: A New Publication and a Refurbished Arts of Africa Gallery,” in Tribal Art magazine (No. 99, Spring 2021), p. 109 (ill.).
Constantine Petridis, ed., The Language of Beauty in African Art, ex. cat. (Yale University Press, 2022), cat. no. 81, p. 140 (ill.).

London, Berkeley Galleries, “Art of Primitive Peoples,” Dec. 1946–Jan. 1947, cat. (ill.).
Ithaca, N.Y., Ithaca College Museum of Art, The Innovative African Sculptor, Nov. 11–Dec. 21, 1969, cat. 4; traveled to Hamilton, N.Y., The Picker Art Gallery, Colgate University, Feb. 15–Mar. 15, 1970.
Potsdam, N.Y., Brainerd Hall Art Gallery, State University College, African Sculpture, Rare and Familiar Forms from the Anspach Collection, Oct. 1974, cat. 106.
Kimbell Art Museum, Forth Worth, Texas, “The Language of Beauty in African Art”, April 3-July 31, 2022; Art Institute of Chicago, Nov. 20, 2022 - Feb. 27, 2023, cat. no. 81.

Unknown owner, London, by 1946 [published in “Art of Primitive Peoples” exh. cat., 1946, no. 12b (ill.)]. Ernst (died 2002) and Ruth Anspach, Greenwich, N.Y., by 1968 to at least 1983 [published in “Anspach Collection,” 1968, no. 3a (not illustrated); “The Innovative African Sculptor,” 1969, no. 4; Bravmann, 1983, pp. 42-43, no. 28]; sold to Tom Slater, Political Gallery, Indianapolis, Ind., by 1997 [this and the following according to personal communication with Tom Slater documented in curatorial file from March 2014]; sold to Robert Laff, Chicago, Ill.; sold to Tom Slater, Political Gallery, Indianapolis; sold to the Art Institute, 1997.

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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