Moon Dancers: Yup’ik Masks and the Surrealists

Published by Di Donna Galleries in conjunction with our collaborative exhibition, Moon Dancers: Yup’ik Masks and the Surrealists explores the historical, artistic and ideological influence of Yup’ik dance masks on the theory and practice of the Surrealist movement. Christina Rudosky traces the central importance of collecting Native American art through the writings of André Breton, while Marie Mauzé relays the significance of masked dances to the Yup’ik. The narrative is completed by a discussion of the Surrealists’ first encounter with Arctic art during exile in New York. 

With additional contributions by Tere Arcq, Paul Branca, Colin Browne, Mary Ann Caws, and Wendy Grossman.

Art in America

"Well-researched scholarly essays discuss the history of Surrealist collecting and the use and meanings of the masks. The authors argue that the relationship between the collector-Surrealist and the masks was more than mere colonial desire because of the anti-anthropocentric Surrealist belief in the power of objects."

- Christopher Green

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The Brooklyn Rail

"André Breton was among those collecting these Yup’ik Moon Dancers’ masks as a prime example of the traditional and ritualistic objects imbued with the magic of which he spoke in an interview about his collection printed in the magnificent catalogue Moon Dancers: Yup’ik Masks and the Surrealists, edited by Jennifer Field, with major essays by Christina Rudosky and Marie Mauzé. Breton saw these masks as justifying the Surrealist vision, giving to the vision a “new impetus . . . isn’t that poetry is as we continue to understand it?”'

- Mary Ann Caws

Read the full The Brooklyn Rail review