Ibibio employ the word iso to refer to both masks and shrines for ancestors and spirits. Conceptually, masks and shrines are one and the same thing. Each provides a face to the power and force of a spirit. Like shrines, both mask and costume are black because the dead are believed to have no color other than black. In order to blacken masks, owners ground charcoal into a soft powder which produces a black pomade when mixed with palm oil. This mask, with its open-eyed, innocent expression and carefully rendered hairstyle quite likely represents Udo Ekpo, a spirit who reinforces principles of law and order in Ibibio communities.