Papier-mâché minstrel face mask from Spell #7: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

A papier-mâché face mask from Spell #7. The oval mask is covered in shiny black paint, with exaggerated facial features highlighted with white paint around the eyes and on the lips, evoking blackface minstrelsy. The paint is chipped and scuffed in some areas. The black paint continues around the edge of the mask’s interior, the rest of which is off-white. A black elastic band tied around the outer edge of each eye hole. There is an inscription [Carol R.] in black ink with the signature [Ntozake Shange] in blue ink in the forehead area of the interior.

Materials, dates and provenance

• Date: 1978
• Created by: Unidentified
• Owned by: Ntozake Shange, American, 1948 - 2018
• Subject of: Crossroads Theatre Company, American, founded 1978
• Type: masks (costume)
• Medium: papier-mâché with paint and ink
• Dimensions: H x W x D: 10 1/2 × 7 × 2 1/4 in. (26.7 × 17.8 × 5.7 cm)
• Topic: African American
• Topic: Blackface
• Topic: Literature
• Topic: Minstrel shows
• Topic: Poetry
• Topic: Race discrimination
• Topic: Theatre
• Topic: Theatre companies
• Object number: 2016.131.1
• Credit Line: Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Gift of Ntozake Shange
• Data Source: National Museum of African American History and Culture

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of African American History and Culture through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed. The underlying object's rights statement is: Unknown - Restrictions Possible Rights assessment and proper usage is the responsibility of the user.