Masks

The use of masks belongs to many different cultures
At the origin masks were used for religious and ceremonial/ritual purposes for instance for rites of passage such as the initiation of young people, marriages, funerals…, and for festivals –in which the use of masks was associated to noise, clamour and colour often to drive away the forces of darkness and to open the way to the spirits of light

Masks in the theatre

Theatre masks can be traced back to the Ancient Greeks.
Traditionally theatrical masks were associated with festivals linked to religious worship in honour of Dionysus. Dionysus was the great Olympian god of wine and festivity, pleasure, fecundity, drunken orgies but also god of vegetation &harvest
Dionysus was celebrated at specific times of the year, once in winter and once in spring.
Later Dionysus was embodied by masked performers (actors) so as to pretend that Dionysus himself was taking part in the ceremony /ies. From this characterisation developed the ritual drama of the period.
The dramatic performances were important to the Athenians (creation of a tragedy competition between playwrights and creation of festival)
In the 5th century Bctheatre became formalized and an even more major part of Athenian culture and civic pride : this century is regarded as th Golden Age of Greek drama

The use of masks developed over time , as ritual drama/theatre evolved

Masks were used for their expressive power .
Typically masks had large exaggerated striking features and large mouths. The mouths were made to project the sound of the voice over the vast amount of space of the open air amphitheatre and made the voices as impressive as the features on the masks – however recent points of view have it that the mouths on the masks were not that large and that the propelling and amplification of sound was due to the incredible acoustics resulting from the way theatres were built.
The use of masks enabled the actors to forget who