Burkinabè culture combines spiritual beliefs and social customs. The country’s traditional art forms include body decoration, fine jewellery, textiles, pottery, folk tales, and stories of magic which are passed down by word of mouth from generation to generation. Each ethnic group has its own artistic style: the Mossi, the Gourounsi, and the Bobo are best known for their carved wooden masks which are used during funeral rites. The Mossi use tall wooden antelope masks and the Bobo are famous for their horizontal butterfly masks which are painted red, black, and white. The Lobi, who don’t use masks, usually carve wooden figures representing gods and ancestors, which are used for ancestral shrines in the home.
The renowned arcitecture of the Bobo and Gourounsi is shown in the photo on the history page. Because they are animists, and believe that the spirits of their dead ancestors live in their homes, they are reluctant to knock houses down. Though houses are built only from timber and unfired mud, some have stood for over three hundred years. The houses of the Gourounsi around Tiébélé, near Pô, are also beautifully decorated with paintings and engravings, work that is always carried out by women.
Every so often artists from all over the world come to a granite hillside just outside Ouagadougou. They come to carve huge sculptures in the granite - of people, animals, and still-life.
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In recent years Burkina has gained an international reputation for its film industry, and every other year Ouagadougou becomes the ‘Hollywood of Africa’ during the Panafrican Cinema Festival (FESPACO).
Photos for Oxfam GB by Crispin Hughes
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