82. KANAK MASK, NEW CALEDONIA apouema wood, pigments 48 cm. high Provenance Mathias Komor, New York Wayne Heathcote, London The term apouema, used to designate Kanak masks, derives from the Cèmuhî word a pwéémwo. Rather than referring to the mask alone, it describes the complete costume including the mask as a single, integrated object (Rivierre, J.C., Dictionnaire cèmuhî-français, Paris, 1994, p.324). Alban Bensa and Guigone Camus (in L'art ancestral des Kanak, Chartres, 2009, pp.108-109) note that, in Kanak society, the mask symbolized a political relationship, marking the alliance between founding clans and the new chief they welcomed. Sometimes offered alongside a roof finial, it affirmed the authority of the new sovereign while acknowledging the clans as both subjects and guardians of the chieftaincy. The materials used for the mask and its attached costume (mourning hair, wood from the giant Houp tree, forest vines, and notou feathers) evoke ancestral ties to the land and its oldest species. Through the mask and its costume, these clans asserted their foundational role within the political structure of the chiefdom. During major ceremonies, the chief wore the mask and, armed with a spear, would charge through the crowd like a fearsome warrior, sending people running in fear. After the chief's death, the mask was returned to the clan that had originally given it. A member of that clan would then wear it during the mourning ceremony, representing the deceased chief, and appear from the forest among the mourners, whose faces were painted white. Although made for the chief, the mask remained closely linked to the founding clans, who held the true authority and gave legitimacy to the chief's leadership. Its materials and dramatic use reflected the Kanak view of political power as rooted in ancestral tradition.