The Oceanic Art Book Thread

Many have been discussing the need for a single, consistent, go-to Oceanic Art book thread for some time.
After a few recent personal finds and the realization that others were very interested as well, here we go...

I think bigbro summed it up best...

“Research CAN be fun, and...if you were a primitive art connoisseur in the 60’s, you had nekkid chicks
hanging out around your pad.”

While the subject of various Tiki and related books has been approached throughout several different threads...

JohnnyP’s “Reference Books for Oceanic Carving Inspiration”
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=26061&forum=7

jtiki’s “Oceanic Art - Books (going to the source)”
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=1135&forum=1

Tom Slick’s “Polynesian/Oceanic Culture...Keeping it REAL(image heavy)”
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=23526&forum=1

Haole Jim’s “Tiki Books, Commmon and Obscure"
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=34808&forum=1

sputnikmoss’s “Tiki Collector and ID Guide Refernce Books”
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=23359&forum=5

teaKEY’s “Read any good books lately [Book Club]”
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=20987&forum=5

Patron Zero’s “Tiki Reference Guide Sought”
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=29857=1

Jungle Trader's "Book Review Thread"
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=17724&forum=6

Robb Hamel's "Tiki: the real thing library"
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=32953&forum=1

pali-uli’s “Tiki Literature! What are you reading?”
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=35492&forum=1&19

...they tend to get derailed off topic and buried early. There is so much great information, but
sometimes it gets overlooked because it is so spread out.

How about a thread completely dedicated to Oceanic art books and other publications for the bibliophiles
that are interested in them--collections, new or newly discovered publications, recommended reading,
possible trading, requests, reviews, and of course, finds in the wild, etc. Sort of an ‘everything under one
thread’ if you will, relating to Oceanic art books, catalogs, magazines and other printed materials.

NOT Polynesian Pop, collecting Pop Tiki, books solely for specific purposes (ie. carving or painting reference),
comic books, subject-related fiction, or travelogues, etc. And, if something is found in the wild, why not
post it in one thread, here, for easy reference rather than having to hunt through “Tiki Finds.”

Here’s what I’m talkin’ about....

This was included in bigbro’s “Origin of early Trader Vic’s logo Tiki found!” thread...
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=24081&forum=1

Here are some other highlights of the aforementioned threads...

JohnnyP

tikimecula

Paipo

Tamapoutini

Creative Chimp

Here's the one that always gets mentioned, The 1946 Museum of Modern Art Arts of the South Seas by
Ralph Linton, Paul S. Wingert and Rene D'Harnoncourt with color illustrations by Miguel Covarrubias

Did anyone ever notice that the subject in Shag's Sepik Explorer is holding this book???

And here's another frequently referenced volume, Pantheon's 1954 Oceanic Art by Herbert Tischner with
the iconic, large black and white photographs by Friedrich Hewicker that usually come up when discussing
PNG drums or the Mauna Loa Detroit Menu...
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?mode=viewtopic&topic=34254&forum=1&start=0

Here are some of the recent finds we made in the wild on our Northern California road trip:

Ethnic Arts Council, ed., Jay D. Frierman, foreword. Art of New Guinea: Sepik, Maprik and Highlands.
UCLA: The Ethnic Art Galleries, 1967.

Hamson, Michael and Richard Aldridge. Art of the Massim & Collingwood Bay. Palos Verdes: Self
Published, 2009.

This is a very interesting self-published paperback--a labor of love, if you will--of long-time Southern
California Oceanic Art collector and dealer Michael Hamson. There is not an abundance of written material
out there on the art of the Massim or Collingwood Bay areas of Northeastern New Guinea, but this one
certainly fills a gap. Most pieces in the book receive their own dramatically photographed, full-page
presentation.

Lincoln, Louise. Assemblage of Spirits: Idea and Image in New Ireland. New York: George Braziller, 1987.

This paperback is essentially the catalog that accompanied the very first United States exhibition of traditional
sculpture from New Ireland at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. For those interested in the malagan ceremony,
this is like dying and going to heaven! It’s just about everything you could want or need to know in a very
thorough and heavily illustrated package.

Gathercole, Peter, Adrienne L. Kaeppler and Douglas Newton. The Art of the Pacific Islands. Washington,
D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 1979.

This inch-thick paperback was produced as a catalog for a 1979 exhibition at the National Gallery of Art,
Washington, D.C., that included many pieces borrowed and assembled from private collections and other
museums worldwide. It’s an excellent illustrated overview of art of the entire Pacific, with some excellent
essays, bibliographic references and very helpful margin cross-referencing to the catalog illustrations.

Dwyer, Jane Powell and Edward Bridgman Dwyer. Traditional Art of Oceania. San Francisco: The Fine
Arts Museums of San Francisco, 1973.

This thin paperback is the Oceania section of the original de Young Museum publication that included
traditional art of Africa and the Americas as well. It presents a very brief overview and highlights of the
collection, including an Abelam ancestor figure gifted by Vic Bergeron and the legendary Trader Vic’s logo
inspired Maori figure.

Rainer, Chris. Where Masks Still Dance: New Guinea. Boston: Bulfinch Pr., 1996.

This is a large format coffee table book of fine art black and white photographs depicting aboriginal tribes
of Papua New Guinea and Irian Jaya. The photographs are absolutely stunning and many of them show the
art in its natural habitat: spirit masks, spirit houses, crocodile canoes, crocodile costumes, wooden effigies,
spirit house posts, war shields, drums, orator’s chairs and more.

Here's one from a recent estate sale

And, here are some of our most prized possessions--a selection of books from Florian Gabriel's personal reference library...

Here's to all the bibliophiles and book nerds out there!!!

Wow, that is quite an exhaustive post, JP! A great index of all the previously posted threads here on TC. And thanks for posting the covers of the two main bibles of mid-century Tiki artists and architects again, "Arts of the South Seas" and "Oceanic Art". The importance of these two can not be overemphasized. They were there early enough to get a lot of use.

Could you tell me, because It temporarily has escaped me, WHERE the "Museum of Primitive Art" was?

Maybe this is the one you are referring to bigbro.

From Columbia Encyclopedia:

Museum of Primitive Art, New York City, a privately supported institution, established in 1957. It was devoted entirely to the arts of the indigenous cultures of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas and to those art objects related to the early civilizations of Asia and Europe. The museum was founded by Nelson A. Rockefeller. In 1976, the museum closed, and the collection was transferred to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Yep, that's it. The existence of that Museum parallels the Tiki Modern period, and Michael D. Rockefeller went missing in Asmat territory while collecting for it. A victim of The Fever, clearly.

nice... i hope the owner of this guy 'devours' some of your suggestions!!

now, stop posting on TC, JP! and make my CD!!! we're coming up on our two year anniversary here in June.... Jezzzzzzz i think JP has the TC Bug!!!!

insane in the membrane.........!

This thread made me painfully aware that my reference and inspiration library SUCKED! My only book was this:

Ellis, George. Oceanic Art - A Celebration of Form San Diego Museum of Art, 2009
128 page catalog of the SDMA exhibit, paperback. Beautiful large, color photographs aranged in order of form: figures, bowls, weapons, etc.

So I picked up a few bargains this week on e-Bay:

Wardwell, Allen. The Sculpture of Polynesia The Art Institute of Chicago, 1967
100 page catalog of the 1967 Art Institute of Chicago exhibit and the 1968 New York Museum of Primitive Art exhibit, paperback. All but 2 photos are black and white, many are rather small. Examines the sculpural characteristics of each of the 10 island groups of Polynesia.

Allan, Tony et al. Journeys Through Dreamtime - Oceanic Myth Duncan Baird Publishers, 1999. 144 pages, hardbound. This book is more of an art inspiration rather than an art reference, but it does have lots of well sized color pictures. About half of the book is about Australian Aborigine myths, but the other half is devoted to Polynesian myth and art.

Nicholas Thomas. Oceanic Art Thames & Hudson Publishers, 1995. 216 pages, small format paperback, "182 illustrations, 26 in color". This is not a coffee table book with lots of big pictures and little text, but reads more like a text book with small pictures - "A distinctive feature of the canoe is the canoe figureheads. These painted carvings usually bear striking shell inlay in patterns corresponding with ceremonial face painting and shell disks in the ears. One ethnologist reported that the figures figures frightened away sea demons who might otherwise imperil the canoe's occupants, which could conceivably be correct, but possibly only speculation based on assumptions about a magical or animistic 'worldview'..." This is not a bad thing, often images are easy to find but information about the images can be more difficult.

I paid $25 People's Republic of Cambridge dollah for it.

Cheap!

Solomon Islands Art

Here's one that isn't mentioned nearly enough:

Oceanic Art: Myth, Man and Image in the South Seas. Carl A. Schmitz. Abrams, 1972.

(photo from net)

This honkin' 420 pager is somewhat of a 'bible' in my library.
It's absolutely chock-full of incredible images, many of which are in a "scrapbook" style separate physical photo page glued onto a plain black background.

The book was originally a German publication (ya-vol!), later translated, and had the distinction of utilizing contributing editor Douglas Newton, then curator of the Primitive art department of the Met. OA art nerds would recognize Mr. Newton as being one of the major 20th-century pioneers in bringing popularity and mass consciousness to Oceanic/Primitive art. OA bibliophiles would know him from Arts of the South Seas: The Collections of the Musee Barbier-Mueller, New Guinea Art in the Collection of the Museum of Primitive Art and Crocodile and Cassowary: Religious Art of the Upper Sepik River, New Guinea, among others.

This is not an easy one to find, but if you do--grab it immediately!!!! It's a mind-blower!!!

Thanks JonPaul...I just ordered myself a copy from AbeBooks.com!

Can't wait to add it to my collection.

This might be stretching the thread subject a little bit, but I didn't know where else to put this. I got this fun book called Contemporary Carving and Whittling, which is the sequel to the Lets Whittle book by Ben Hunt that was shown in the Book of Tiki.

Some fun projects in the book.

My favorite, the PNG shield which turns into a corner light project.

DC

This seemed to be the most relevant place to put this.
If not, I apologize.

A friend sent me this link to Bamboo Work.
I downloaded it as a PDF here.
If you don't want to read it online or download it, it is available on Amazon both new and used.

Jonpaul,

Wanted to thank you for putting this thread together, it has really inspired me to beef up my collection of reading material. Many of the classics you have listed are available for $5 to $20 on line.

Here is one I found that has some great photos, info and art.

The Art of the Papuan Gulf by Michael Harrison.

You can see more of the book here:

http://www.michaelhamson.com/catalog_10/catalog.htm

The author is selling copies directly on ebay for a discounted price.

DC

A-HA! I've been digging for a thread like this! Perfect! Fantastic examples and exactly what I've been looking for! Unfortunately my local bookstores do not carry copies of any of the books listed or really any books on Polynesian/Oceanic subject matter. One of the employees didn't even know what Oceanic art is! I'm assuming the majority of these finds have been on ebay and other sites? I was hoping to find a copy or two in person, but so far no luck.

I also apologize for necro-posting, but this is one of the first threads on Oceanic art books that I saw!

http://www.bookfinder.com/

Great thread!
Just cost me some dough though.

Just received my copy of Arts Of The South Seas in the mail today! Cost me 15 clams, and it's worth every one! Incredible pieces in this book

Great thread Jon Paul, if anyone is interested in the real stuff there is a great exhibition at the Musee du quai branly in Paris, We went a couple of weeks ago and it is amazing what they have there(I hope you went on your recent trip Sven?)If anyone is in Europe well worth a visit to what real Tiki is all about,Not to mention the shrunken heads!Here are a couple of pics of about 40 i took There are also a lot of books available in the gift shop but mostly in French but still great images

Thanks for the contributions.

I just picked up the Ben Hunt books.

I need to carve an outrigger, and that's going to be a huge help.

Just got this book in the mail.
On Pg 15 is this carving.
At the last Kahiki sale I bought this carving.
Not the same one, but it does have more of a old look feel to it.
Makes me wonder who made this copy.
Was told by Bill Sapp that a lot of the Kahiki decor came from Mexico.

"Roses are red, these floats are blue, Send me some money and they belong to you"..."TIKISKIP"

[ Edited by: tikiskip 2012-12-17 18:03 ]

Ok, Great Thread you all.
I am however stuck with a question as I am looking at pulling the trigger on the Adrienne Lois Kaeppler edition of Oceanic Art, And the question is: How many of these books are filled with many of the same photographs?

I other words, after I spend $100.00 on this book, how necessary would a copy of say, Anthony P Meyer's edition of Oceanic Art be?

Although I probably wind up with the Hewicker and Tischner edition eventually because it's a classic, and others, I have limited room for my library at the moment and I want something I can pour over and over for carving inspiration.

Just trying to get the most bang for my buck on this one.

Thanks!

This thread needs a bump. I got some new books for Christmas and organized my Tiki bookshelf into the Tiki Pop side:

And the Oceanic Arts side.

Question for the book worms out there: Several of my books, like Oceanic Art: Myth, Man and Image in the South Seas by Schmitz and the Art of the South Seas Islands, have color photo inserts that were glued to the pages and the photos are coming unattached. Does anybody have a recommendation for an archival type of glue to re-attach them?

Thanks to Jon Paul for organizing this thread, looking forward to adding some more to the collection as funds permit.

DC