Polynesian/Oceanic Culture...Keeping it REAL(image heavy)

I found this auction on ebay for a book. What startled me was the selling price. over $500 for a book with 136 or so pages. I decided to start this topic as not to derail other topics.Here's what was said about the book from the sellers point of view:
"VERY rare original copy of the epic work on Polynesian Art. Profusely illustrated with 136 full page plates of artifacts from Hawaii, Tahiti, Tonga, Fiji, Marquesas Islands, Australs, Cooks, Easter Island etc. Issued by the Polynesian Society in 1943, it is rarely seen on the market, especially such an important copy as this that belonged to the famous Peabody Museum Anthropologist and author of note Dr. Donald Stanley Marshall. This copy is in excellent condition and should attract considerable attention world wide! Page count in total is 222 pages with full provenance of each object illustrated along with size etc. The Oldman collection was eventually sold by Mr. Oldman to the New Zealand Government and is the finest collection of Polynesian Objects ever formed so if you have an interest in Polynesian Art then this is a must have. As with all of our auctions this rare volume is put up without any reserve what so ever so good luck."

Heres the link to the auction, which will die in 90 days.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ih=019&sspagename=STRK%3AMEWA%3AIT&viewitem=&item=290086240884&rd=1&rd=1

I am adding the pics from the auction as well, to document this topic as well as ensure future readers to be able to see the images...

To the artists and contributors of TC...I would applaud anyones efforts to keep this topic ON TOPIC, and always come back here to discuss relevant topics such as artistic styles vs. Traditional/Original/South Pacific/Oceanic arts. Hope you enjoy!

Wow, I have a couple of books, one being Meyer's, and they all have the same stuff from book to book. These are new variations on other items I've seen. Very nice stuff. Those spears are just evil intentions waiting to happen. Love them. BK should try one like that. Look at that tip.

Wow! BK, you need that thing --only $500!

Held that book and many more like it in my hands in January... in the Arts and Humanities room in my public library...

Search it out, librarys are great places!

Thank you, Tom. I like posts with IMAGES! And here are many I have not seen before. This partially explains the high price:

A.) Try to find art books that deal solely with POLYNESIAN art, and you will notice that most Oceanic Art books (like 85%), current and vintage, have a mixture of Melanesian, Micronesian, and Polynesian art in them, with the large part being Melanesian. This is because there is such a profusion of Papua New Guinea objects out there in comparison to what the missionaries allowed to survive from Polynesia. So to find such a book, with such large illustrations, is rare. I bet many Museum libraries don't even have this one.

B.) This collection is now owned by the New Zealand Museum. But how much is on display? Very little, I am certain. Museums all over the world have large stockpiles of ancient art in their storage that they do not have the budget to display. So for scholars, this is a rare chance to catch a glimpse of stuff stored away forever in that Raiders of the Lost Ark warehouse.

But books like these should not only be of interest to academic scholars (this is why you posted it), but to Tiki artists everywhere. And not only to BK, our fine premier traditionalist, but to freestyle Tiki makers too. As I mourned in my post in the Collecting Tiki/VLV mug thread, the Tiki revival has been going in circles artistically, because too few new artists seem to bother to study the large variety of authentic Polynesian and Oceanic objects and styles that are out there in Oceanic Art books and museums. But with no connection to the original culture, a pop version of that culture becomes meaningless.

This research does nor have to be done with such a high price tag as above, but does require a little effort.

I was pretty interested to see this thread as the Oldman collection is a pet subject of mine. Both editions (Polynesian and Maori) of the catalogue were reprinted here in NZ a couple of years ago by the Polynesian Society - I think they cost me about 35 bucks (NZ) each:

I told BK about these a while back.

On 2007-03-28 11:40, bigbrotiki wrote:

B.) This collection is now owned by the New Zealand Museum. But how much is on display? Very little, I am certain. Museums all over the world have large stockpiles of ancient art in their storage that they do not have the budget to display. So for scholars, this is a rare chance to catch a glimpse of stuff stored away forever in that Raiders of the Lost Ark warehouse.

Not just one museum - four regional museums carved up the bulk of the collection: Te Papa (Wellington - then known as the Dominion Museum), Auckland, Otago and Canterbury. Duplicate items were shared out between these museums and smaller regional museums against Oldman's wishes, who wanted all examples of a type to be available to scholars in one location.
Most of these museums have extensive Pacific wings where they have many of their Oldman pieces on display, with one notable exception - Canterbury Museum, the closest to where I live! They had first pick of Hawaiian and Easter Island pieces and have some of the finest and rarest items in the world, but no dedicated Pacific Gallery in which to show them. I am constantly amazed when looking through my books to see how many spectacular pieces are in Christchurch, yet I have never seen them! I am working towards a visit to see some of these treasures "from the vault".

myspace

[ Edited by: Paipo 2007-03-28 14:18 ]

Can I borrow 500 bucks from anyone here? :)

Aaah, I love TC, with its Tiki agents! Great local info, Paipo, thanks. Are those reprints still available?

On 2007-03-28 14:41, bigbrotiki wrote:
Are those reprints still available?

I got them through this page bigbro - there is an email address right down at the bottom.

That looks like a great book. I really enjoyed the pictures of some of the pieces next to their sennit bags and containers. Many of these pieces would be wrapped in sennit fiber nearly all the time and thus unviewable in their native cultures. The act of the priest wrapping the object in sennit, barkcloth and other materials while repeating prayers charged the objects with mana.

The books are still available. I bought mine a while back through Amazon and Book Finder.

Nice---if you posted this in 'Tiki Carving', as an inspirational guide, you may see a significant surge in sales of these books--- mine is on the way! Thanks guys!

Thanks for posting the pics...what a great book. I agree about posting in the carving forum...fabulous resource for artists. Only way it could have been better is if the pictures were in color...hey that could be a project for someone. :)

Are all the photographs in the reprint books black and white?

These are the coolest swizzle sticks I have ever seen. Sorry, I had to side track a little bit...

Seeing these pieces still wrapped up, in person would just send shivers up my spine.

On 2007-03-29 12:26, TikiSan wrote:
Are all the photographs in the reprint books black and white?

Yes, and the plates are pretty small - about 4" x 5 1/2".

On 2007-03-29 13:33, Swanky wrote:

These are the coolest swizzle sticks I have ever seen. Sorry, I had to side track a little bit...

Seeing these pieces still wrapped up, in person would just send shivers up my spine.

The staff gods were some of Oldman's favourite items. The Cook Islands pieces went to Otago Museum, Dunedin - not a city many visitors to NZ stop in but well worth a visit. I spent two afternoons there on my last trip down South. They also have one of the few large stone moai in museum collections.
The staff god on the far right of that pic belongs to Canterbury Museum (my "local" which I mentioned earlier who keep all their stuff in the basement) because it was one of Otago's unwanted "duplicates", but is on loan to the Museum in Rarotonga, where I saw it last July! Nearly all the good (ie not reproduction) pieces in Rarotonga were on loan from NZ museums.

I've plugged this book before but will do it again seeing it fits in this thread...I finally got my own copy a couple of weeks ago and it's one of the best I've ever seen:

I will definitely check into getting these books for myself. I always reference traditional pieces for my own paintings. Ive received as gifts recently a couple of books on Oceanic Art that have images Ive not seen before.

One is caled Oceanic Art, published in Italy in 1966 by Fratelli Fabbri, Milan

The other is a exhibit book from the Metropolitan Museum of Art 1969

Theres one more I found thrifting but I will have to dig for it. I do like the big color plates of artifacts, very inspirational.
Nothing beats great reference materials!

look how normal this Kava kava man is. (discusses more than fifty works, ranging from robust stone images to refined wooden sculpture)$ 15.56 It is a related book to the "Pacific encounters" $30.24 here

Here is a short film about the Oldman Collection - based on William Oldman's personal 16mm film copy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mlststSsU-U

That short film is pretty great! Thanks for posting.

[ Edited by: Tiare 2015-01-10 14:23 ]

Fantastic video, thanks Vern!