Dig It - 7/28/22
Well Fellow Seekers, today I want to discuss collecting Mexican Masks.
Mexican masks are one of the most wonderful, affordable, and magical categories of ethnographic art. Mexicans have been carving, wearing, and dancing masks since Olmec times, roughly three thousand years ago. They are worn at fiestas and feast days as well more somber events like Christian holy days and pagan ceremonial dances. The characters, creatures, gods, saints, mythical beings, and ancestors represented by masks are endless and only limited by the imagination of the carvers.
When collecting these masks as ethnographic artifacts, you want to make sure they were made for Native use or as we say in the business, “Danced”. You can usually tell this by the wear and patina on the inside of the mask. Most authentic Mexican masks start around, $350-450 and go up to as much as $10,000, which is quite a wide range in price. Suffice it to say, you can get wonderful examples in the $650 to $1,500 dollar range.
This mask dates to the late 20th century and probably comes from the Mexican state of Guerrero. It has the look of a Luchador mask and shows how the star wrestlers of today have become the mythic heroes in today’s Mexican folk traditions. It sells for $750. There are not many categories of art where you can get a significant piece for under $1,000. Seek Out!