A death mask is a plaster or wax cast made of a person's face following death. Death masks may be mementos of the dead, or be used for creation of portraits. It is sometimes possible to identify portraits that have been painted from death masks, because of the characteristic slight distortions of the features caused by the weight of the plaster during the making of the mould.

In the seventeenth century, it was common for death masks to be used as part of the effigy of the deceased, displayed at state funerals. During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries they were also used to permanently record the features of corpses for the purposes of identification. This function was later replaced by photography.

Proponents of phrenology and ethnography also used both death masks and life masks (taken from living subjects) for scientific and pseudoscientific purposes.

Actor Tor Johnson is the subject of one of the most famous purported death masks of all time. His likeness was made into a halloween mask that has been a best seller to this day. Unfortunately, this seems to be untrue. While there is a Tor Johnson halloween mask, it appears to be an urban legend that the mask was crafted from his death mask. Most likely, it was made from a cast of his face taken by the makeup department during the filming of one of his many horror films.

External links

• Laurence Hutton Collection of Life and Death Masks

Art genres | Death customs

Totenmaske | デスマスク | Dödsmask | Posmrtná maska