Adone Headdress

Adone Headdress

Kurumba Culture

Mali

Kurumba

Upper Haute Volta, Ouahigouya area

The Kurumba culture of Upper Volta and Mali of West Africa created a headdress known as the Adone, which is a stylized depiction of an antelope. The Adone in this exhibit is clearly a 20th century version of the headdress, as it has a large half-domed mask at the bottom of the sculpture that conceals the face of the masquerader, and it has holes along the edges of this mask, so that wearers of the headdress may tie raffia to the holes to cover the neck and shoulders and conceal their identities. The antelope figure is also painted in colorful geometric patterns in blue, red, and white pigments, whil earlier versions of the Adone used black, white, and reddish-brown pigments.

The Adone headdress is used predominantly in funerary rituals, and it forms and important part of the grieving process. The wearers of the headdress serve as pallbearers, escorting the body to the burial site and overseeing the placement of the body in the grave.

Research by Ross Kenagy, 2013, Missouri State University student. Mentor: Dr. Billie Follensbee

148.5 cm h. x 27 cm w. x 79 cm d.

sculpture

wood

carving

Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Harold Stoneman

1985.38

1985

20110006