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Halloween mask
Unknown1999/2002
Nordiska Museet
Stockholm, Sweden
Details
- Title: Halloween mask
- Creator: Unknown
- Date Created: 1999/2002
- Use: Stockholm, Sweden
- Subject: Grim Reaper mask, Scream mask
- Physical Dimensions: w15 x h41 cm
- More Information: In the late 1990s, Halloween celebrations became extremely popular in Sweden. Nordiska museet documented the custom between 2001 and 2002 and collected nearly 100 items. Halloween has been especially embraced by children and adolescents in Sweden and it is celebrated mainly in pre-schools, afterschool recreation centres and schools. Staff see an educational value in talking with children about fear and death. But critical voices compare the serious and sedate Swedish celebration of All Saints' Day with the high-spirited and commercial Halloween celebrations from America, with their more playful attitude toward death. At Halloween the world is turned upside down in a carnivalesque spirit that allows taboos to be transcended and playing with the rules that otherwise govern life and death. Scaring people and behaving badly is permitted, all behind a mask that provides the courage to dare to misbehave. For one evening, the roles are reversed. Children dictate the terms and adults are punished with tricks if they do not obey.
- Materials and Techniques: Mask made of plastic and fabric
- Type: Clothing
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