Masking Animals

This chapter explores masking as a semiotic and ethical device within interspecies relations, focusing on theatrical performances involving Japanese macaques. Through analyses of visual artworks, photography, and performance traditions such as Sarumawashi, it examines how masks simultaneously confer and deny humanity, revealing asymmetries of power between human and nonhuman animals. The study investigates masking as a dispositif that structures visibility, identity, and agency, highlighting the role of mimicry, anthropomorphism, and staged performance in negotiating the boundaries between species. Drawing on philosophical reflections on faciality, ethics, and subjectivity, the chapter argues that the mask exposes the constructed nature of the human–animal divide and challenges anthropocentric assumptions by revealing how humanity imposes simulations of itself upon other species. Ultimately, the chapter proposes that artistic practices using animal masking can uncover the ethical stakes of recognition, domination, and coexistence, rethinking the face as a site of interspecies encounter rather than exclusive human privilege.