The Functional Metaphor of African Mythology And Its Stylistic Transformations In Ceramic Mask Sculpture

Abstract

The research addresses the concept of metaphor and function, with its mythological and legendary aspect, encompassing the artist's experience in mask sculpting and its stylistic transformations in mask form. This includes the proportion and harmony of mask shapes, as well as the external influences they contain, in the form of religious beliefs that arouse the artist's aesthetic inclinations. Through these stylistic metaphors, the artist was able to employ these metaphors, resulting in a final result: the engineering of the human face, in terms of color and the materials used to transform the mask's shape. Therefore, the research demonstrates the functional metaphor of the mask form, with its symbolic influences, which haunted the African artist, who crafted his creative material in the form of sacred symbols and magical beings charged with emotion and rhythmic harmony. He drew on these sculptural metaphors for masks and conveyed the ideal human face, paying little attention to the differences between the facial features of the masks, which bear only the ideal characteristics of these faces. He transformed them into symbolic faces of an abstract nature, retaining intellectual and cognitive dimensions, crafted in an artistic style that allows for the liberation of these desires and instincts, pushing them beyond a symbolic threshold that expresses advanced social systems that gain the appreciation and admiration of society. Accordingly, the current research addresses the functional metaphor of African mythology and its stylistic transformations in ceramic mask sculpture. The research consists of four chapters. The first chapter includes the methodological framework of the research and contains the research problem, summarized in the following question: What are the most important functional metaphors of mythology and their stylistic transformations in ceramic mask sculpture? The importance of the research and its objectives are:

- Identifying the intellectual and psychological dimensions of the functional metaphor of mythology and its stylistic transformations in ceramic mask carving.

Defining the most important terms.

The second chapter, "The Theoretical Framework of the Research," presents the history of the functional metaphor of African mythology and its stylistic transformations in ceramic mask carving since its inception and development, the most important artists who contributed to it, its most important intellectual and literary resources, and the stages of their lives and production in ceramic mask carving.

This chapter also includes the most important indicators reached by the theoretical framework and previous studies.

The third chapter includes the research procedures, including the research community, the research sample, the research tool, and the analysis of the research sample, which comprised (5) works by African artists, intentionally selected based on several justifications.

The fourth chapter includes the research results, the most important of which are:

1- The African artist embodies unrealistic ideas derived from imagination, dreams, and the implications of the free subconscious in ceramic mask carving.

The conclusions, the most important of which are:

1- It describes a state of human oppression that forces a person to "exit" and "deviate" from all that is familiar, resorting to dreams to escape living on the margins of tyrants even harsher than himself. Through his ceramic works, he seeks to engage the recipient's feelings and transport them to the imagination, from which he blends dreams with reality.

The chapter also includes research sources.