Interesting Vessel - Tiki or Not Tiki

Here is a find that has me asking myself the question...Tiki or Not Tiki? I found this not too long ago and was facinated by the striking detail. The lines are simple and the detail becomes more apparent the longer you look at it. The height is about 6 1/4 inches. The interior has a glossy tan/yellow glaze and the exterior a slightly textured milk-chocolate appearance. The interior is hollow, following the exterior curves..the walls are about 1/8 inch thick. I do not know the provenience of this one, Trader Vic's perhaps? It looks like something he'd market, but am just not sure. Any suggestions?

Oh Yea, the little objects you see between the bottom of the wahine and the shelf are little protectors/bumpers I stuck on there to stabilize it.

[ Edited by: Swamp Tiki 2006-04-25 20:53 ]

[ Edited by: Swamp Tiki 2006-04-25 20:54 ]

[ Edited by: Swamp Tiki 2006-04-25 20:55 ]

[ Edited by: Swamp Tiki 2006-04-25 20:56 ]

I say ... TIKI!

i think treasure craft made a vase that resembles the one you have. the difference being in color, dark brown as opposed to the lighter brown glaze on your vase.

does anyone have the piece i am referring to?

It's very cool, I've also seen one that was painted black with red and gold accents. I think it might have been originally used as a vase, but if it was intended for drinking out of, then what a mug. I wouldn't call it "tiki" but if i had one i would display it with my tiki mugs. If you could find evidence of it being used in a tiki bar then that might change my mind but still a nice find, peace.

Not tiki if you don't own it, tiki if you own it. I saw one on Ebay just a bit ago.

It's not Tiki, but I own one :)
It is definitely a fitting Tiki bar accoutrement. I am struggling with my Tiki definition while I am writing the Witco book, which has a couple of leopard/African named pieces in it. For now they all bunch up under the "Tiki Modern" moniker, which means that in the 50s/60s influences from ALL genres of primitive art merged into one genre, where nevertheless the TIKI shape dominated.

In an earlier discussion about the Tiki-ness of Papua New Guinea art I also postulated that it is all a matter of balance: Tiki Modern is NOT a mono-Polynesian culture, the mixing in of Beachcomber/Trader/Melanesian and other "primitive" items is very important, but the Polynesian theme should dominate.

To paraphrase my own motto "If it says Tiki on it, it should have Tiki in it" I would concede "by at least 78 %". There are things that are not Tiki in form, but very Tiki in spirit. For those, like the vase above, I reserve the term "Pop primitivism".

My vase is painted with red lips, black hair, and a white bone.

[ Edited by: bigbrotiki 2006-04-27 03:10 ]

I believe it's been discussed before, but this reminds me of the recurring question - is a moai tiki? For that matter, is Easter Island / Rapa Nui part of Polynesia?

Along the same lines, isn't it a little funny that Hawaii is not in the South Pacific?

-Randy

I do believe that Easter Island is in Polynesia and Moai are certainly tiki, 100%

Yea, I gotta agree. Easter Island is technically in Polynesia...or Oceania.

Swamp

Agree that Rapa Nui is generally considered part of Polynesia - I guess it's partly by cultural association and partly by geography. My impression is that some of the other Pacific islands, even closer to the main area of Polynesia than Easter Island is, are not considered part of Polynesia, maybe because of less direct cultural association. Probably the lines get blurry though, and that's the part that I personally find interesting about what bigbro was discussing, especially in the differences between popular modern notions of tiki and sort of historical / anthropological tiki forms.

For example, I'd say a moai is a tiki in the pop sense, but not in the traditional sense. The skinny, starved moai kava kava figures do not seem tiki at all to me in either a pop or scientific sense. But if we tried to get all technical about it, it'd be hard to explicitly say why. They're both from the same island, and both are figural representations derived from human forms, with some kind of spiritual meaning.

More examples on this page. There are a few images here from Hawaiian mythology, but for some reason only one of them is really consistent with the more common pop form of tiki.

There's also that whole discussion about why "tiki" drinks are mostly based on Caribbean rums. But anyway, I hope I didn't derail this a whole lot.

-Randy

Rapa Nui is the Southern corner of the Polynesian triangle, why doubt it's Polynesia?

Moai are Tiki Modern because Thor's Aku Aku made them a popular icon, and they were utilized in Polynesian Pop extensively. Kava Kava men are not Tiki Modern because no Poly Pop places ever used them as icons.

What restaurant would wanna use mean lookin', rib-cage showing old guys as advertisement?

They are nevertheless cool Oceanic art.