Photo of collection object Man Spirit Mask
Cole, Willie. Man Spirit Mask, 1999. 3 panels of photoetching, silkscreen, and woodcut on paper (unframed), Each panel: 39 1/8 x 26 1/2 in. (99.4 x 67.3 cm). Emily Winthrop Miles Fund, 2000.109a-c. © Willie Cole © artist or artist's estate.

Man Spirit Mask

1999

Willie Cole

American, born 1955

Contemporary Art

In this image, Willie Cole uses an iron to connect with painful and lingering histories of racial oppression, commenting on the extent to which the marks of the past live on in the present. The iron, which left a singed impression in the middle panel, suggests domestic service (Cole’s mother and grandmother both worked as housekeepers), but its form also recalls both the European ships that carried captive African laborers to the Americas and historical African masks.

In the first and third panels, Cole superimposes the iron-as-mask image over his own face. By connecting a suggestion of iron marks to his face in the first panel, Cole further evokes the manner in which history has marked his body. He suggests both ritual scarification patterns and the branding irons that turned the bodies of African laborers into Western commodities.
Maker/Artist
Cole, Willie
Classification
Print
Formatted Medium
3 panels of photoetching, silkscreen, and woodcut on paper (unframed)
Dimensions
Each panel: 39 1/8 x 26 1/2 in. (99.4 x 67.3 cm)
Inscribed
Inscribed in lower left of (a): "14/40"
Departments
Contemporary Art
Accession Number
2000.109a-c
Credit Line
Emily Winthrop Miles Fund
Rights Statement
© artist or artist's estate
Dominant Colors

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