The Coleman-Ladd Mask

Perhaps the most precious object in the BAPRAS Collection is the first world war Coleman-Ladd mask.

Manufactured in Paris by American artist Anna Coleman-Ladd, it is testament to all those facially disfigured servicemen who could not be satisfactorily reconstructed at the time using their own tissues. In an attempt to return these soldiers to being functional members of society, Coleman-Ladd and similar prostheticians all over Europe, including Archie Lane at Sidcup used their artistic skills combined with sculptural engineering to fashion these masks from painted tin, silver and copper sheet. 

The mask was donated to the BAPRAS collection by our Gillies Archivist, Andrew Bamji. He acquired it in the Untied States. We are not aware of any other example by Coleman-Ladd. As such, it rarely leaves the Collection, but has been occasionally loaned to exhibitions such as the Venice Biennale in 2022.

Black and white images in this gallery courtesy American Red Cross Collection, Library of Congress