Handmade Willow Wood Mask, "Amazed"

This wonderful mask is crafted by the artisans of the Kamsá Biyá Community in the southern Colombian Andes. In keeping with their cultural and spiritual traditions, they use such masks in ceremonies where they ingest a native plant with medicinal and psychoactive properties called ayahuasca. Artisans carve the mask by hand from basket willow wood, covering one side with tiny black and white glass beads in elabourate patterns. The Kamsá or Kamëntsá are an indigenous people living in the Sibundoy Valley.