Anyone know this mold is

[jtw1313]

Thinking this is a mold for bronze casting........if Can anyone help with this and mark it is Appreciated Mustache is curled on ends
It is plaster

 

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[GoldieLocks]

I think it is the product of a mold because it is ment to be hung by the hook. It is painted deliberately. I am not sure I could make one so well if I tried. It might be a Death Mask. See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_mask

 

[GopherDaGold]

Death mask.

 

[Joe-Dirt]

Remember remember the 5th of November. Death mask sounds right

 

[Plug N Play]

Paul Gauguin death mask
"bronze cast resin". They go for about $100, depending.

 

[Charlie P. (NY)]

Agree with GoldiLocks. The mold would have been casting sand or ceramic.

And I also agree with Plug N Play: definitely Paul Gauguin.

 

[Madmox]

I don’t think that is a death mask. An art piece.

 

[Red-Coat]

I don’t think that is a death mask. An art piece.

I believe you’re correct. I deleted my post saying so, after Plug N Play correctly identified it as a ‘Gaugin’ representation. Kicked myself for not recognising it.

It’s very much an artist-crafted piece and not a true cast (whether ‘death-mask’ or the in-vivo equivalent ‘life-mask’).

Hundreds of them have been produced from various sources with varying degrees of artistic skill and my understanding is that they all ultimately derive from a ceramic work produced by Gaugin in 1889, known as “Jug Self Portrait”. It’s a sculptural work, not produced from a cast of his face, in which Gaugin portrayed himself as a severed head with closed eyes, one ear cut off and dripping with blood (a probable nod to his friend van Gogh) in the manner of a death-mask.



It’s believed to have been inspired by the guillotine execution of the murderer ‘Prado’ (Count Linska de Castillon) at La Roquette Prison on 28 December 1888. Some 200 celebrities, including Gaugin were granted access as spectators. Gaugin later developed a fascination with masks but, as far as I know, he never produced this self portrait as an isolated mask form… this was an adaptation by someone else, copied from his jug after his death, and successively reproduced in modified form by multiple generations of copying.

They’re variously referred to as Gaugin ‘death-masks’, ‘life-masks’, ‘life-death masks’ and ‘sculptures de têtes’.

This one seems to be bronzed plaster or some kind of ceramic resin and produced just for wall-hanging.

 

[Plug N Play]

" Paul Gauguin Tete du Sculpteur. For more than half a century after the artist's death this magnificent life mask was not publicly exhibited and not even known to exist except by a few experts - until it emerged from a private collection and was auctioned off at a New York gallery as the head of a "Tattooed native Tahitian." Now recognized by scholars as a self-portrait, the mask was recently acquired by The Sculpture Collectors Limited."

Made so you can hang it or post it.

 

[ArfieBoy]

When I was a young lad in the 1960's and thought I was going to be an artist I joined and art "club," "association" or whatever designation the called themselves. A premium for joining was and actual size copy of this very art piece. According to the club it was done by Paul Gaugin as a self-portrait while he was in Fiji (?) after he left his wife and family in France and traveled to the south Pacific on his own. I had the piece for years before it disappeared. I don't know what ever happened to it!

 

[Red-Coat]

" Paul Gauguin Tete du Sculpteur. For more than half a century after the artist's death this magnificent life mask was not publicly exhibited and not even known to exist except by a few experts - until it emerged from a private collection and was auctioned off at a New York gallery as the head of a "Tattooed native Tahitian." Now recognized by scholars as a self-portrait, the mask was recently acquired by The Sculpture Collectors Limited."

Made so you can hang it or post it.

View attachment 1863905

I'm not entirely convinced. The figure itself does seem to be of Gaugin, but no proof that he created it. Your quote is taken verbatim from an unattributed label stuck on one of the copies... as for this report from Worthpoint, which is merely regurgitating information from an eBay seller with such a piece:

https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/paul-gauguin-death-mask-sculpture-136924766


I can find no other reference source which supports the story and no mention of it by any recognised authority on Gaugin's work. I also struggle to believe that this romanesque moustachied face could ever have been seriously believed to be a "tattooed native Tahitian". Happy to be corrected if a proper source for the information can be found.

 

[Plug N Play]

You're right, Red-Coat. I'm not seeing a second source, either. "Head of a Savage" has a similar story, with the third one appearing in 1957, if I read it right. And this one, life mask/death mask self portrait, does suspiciously follow that same time line. And the "Head With Horns" multi million dollar fraud certainly points to big players, big auction houses, big money, and a situation where this original might be a fraud, also.

All the copies, and there are lots in all different materials, they would be copied after the "fraud", right ... do we see any appearing before, say 1957 ?
I can't really get a good grasp what is going on with it all. This mask looks more like it may have been tailored after "Head of a Savage" in an attempt to give it credibility ?

I'm amazed by how many copies are sold in such a large variety of materials. That's where OP's falls, I think ... a bronze resin cast ... generally accepted as copies of a Gauguin mask ... but, as you point out, there should be more of a verifiable trail for the original that this was copied from ?

 

[\NerdyRockGirl/]

It reminds me of a death mask... Know nothing about this stuff, but there were also something called life masks. They were taken post humously obviously for death masks and Life Masks while living.

 

[Red-Coat]

It reminds me of a death mask... Know nothing about this stuff, but there were also something called life masks. They were taken post humously obviously for death masks and Life Masks while living.

Yes, life-masks were commonly made of famous people too, but this piece is clearly sculptural in nature and from the hand of an artist; not a direct cast, whether of someone alive or dead. The moustache also presents certain difficulties in casting from life, although details like that can be added afterwards of course.

This is a life-mask of Abraham Lincoln, cast in the spring of 1860 by Leonard Volk, shortly before Abe grew a beard. The hands were cast not long afterwards.



Of the plaster casting process, Volk said: It was about an hour before the mold was ready to be removed, and being all in one piece, with both ears perfectly taken, it clung pretty hard, as the cheek-bones were higher than the jaws at the lobe of the ear. He [Lincoln] bent his head low and took hold of the mold, and gradually worked it off without breaking or injury; it hurt a little, as a few hairs of the tender temples pulled out with the plaster and made his eyes water. Lincoln said he found the process "anything but agreeable."

 

[jtw1313]

Thank you everyone for all the replies and information on this