Polynesian Masterworks in Museum Fünf Kontinente

 

“Fisherman’s God” — Figure of a Supernatural Being
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Marietta Weidner

 
 
 

Polynesian Masterworks in Museum Fünf Kontinente

 

Curated by Steven G. Alpert

 
 

The Museum Fünf Kontinente (The Museum of Five Continents) in Munich is no stranger to the followers of Art of the Ancestors. This grand museum, founded in 1862 and formerly known as the Staatliches Museum für Völkerkunde, was Germany's first museum dedicated to ethnological preservation. It contains many items of excellence in tandem with a long history of scholarship and high-caliber curation. In 2022, we presented seventeen Island Southeast Asian masterworks from their august holdings. This month we highlight twenty items from The Museum Fünf Kontinente's formidable and beautiful aggregation of Polynesian creations.

From the collection, eight of the Museum's most distinctive Māori items from New Zealand (Aotearoa: The land of the long white cloud) are illustrated. Looking at these items, I am continually instructed by one of my favorite Maori proverbs. "He toi whakairo, he mana tangata: Where there is artistic excellence, there is human dignity.” A tohunga, or highly-trained expert, worked and embellished their given materials (as with Polynesian items in general) to bring forth their most pleasing and practical qualities. Traditionally, the works presented here were imbued with the understanding that everything possesses an inherent spirit or essence, forces that a tohunga could possibly burnish and reveal through their creations.

Given this worldview, what might appear initially as seemingly humble items were, in fact, created with special care or purpose. A small highly worked tinder box (pouaka) held by a crouched tattooed figure (the lid is now lost) is very similar to a famous one from the Oldman collection in New Zealand's Te Papa or National Museum. These were used to hold tinder and a striker, or a sacred ember of a chief's fire. Another item of interest is a footrest from a Maori digging spade (ko). Embellished footrests assisted in 'opening up' the earth with song and chants while planting sweet potatoes, 'the food of the gods' (kūmara). Mounded gardens were neatly attended to from the moment of their creation and throughout the entire growing season. Māori society is especially spirited and competitive during certain activities or games, such as when perfecting their skills with weapons (para-whakawai), wrestling (mamau), or martial dances (haka), which were all used to further embellish or hone one's martial skills. This included dart-throwing competitions that took place on or near sacred communal spaces (marae) that served social and religious purposes. It should be noted that darts were also the only projectile weapons used by the Māori in traditional warfare. The contorted figure at the end of a fine throwing stick for that purpose (kōtaha) dates to the late 18th or early 19th century.

 
 
 

Photo of a Māori chief from Emerald Hours in New Zealand (1906), a travelogue by English tourist Alys Lowth Adlam (writing as Alys Lowth). The book was illustrated with numerous photographs and diagrams, some attributed, supplied by her and her publisher.

 
 
 

The Māori are also justly famed for their ability to work with highly intractable nephrite (pounamu), a form of greenstone, using only water, friction, and natural abrasives to create a taonga or treasured object. Two fine neck pendants from nephrite are illustrated. The first is an excellent example of a hei-tiki, literally a 'hanging figure' that is said to represent one's living connection to their ancestral line. Hei-tiki are among the Maori's most treasured and highly recognizable artistic forms. The second pendant is one that is much more rarely encountered. It's known as a koropepe, which is also an heirloom object and guardian image, but in the form of a spiraling eel. Eels, which can be large and delicious (I've caught many there), were an important traditional food source. As a mythical creature, the koropepe coveys safety, connectedness, and abundance, particularly when transitioning from one state or phase to another.

Impressive examples of larger Māori works include an ornamented stern or upright tailboard board from a war canoe (waka taua) that could sit around eighty paddlers. Standing more than five feet tall, this fully embellished board at its base depicts a hunkered figure of the storm god, Paikea. This carving was once paired with a vigorously decorated jutting prow ornament. The tailboard's surface still retains a deep glowing reddish-brown color as the wood was once presumably honored and protected with kokowai, an admixture of a ground hematite-based ochre infused with shark or other fish oils. At the time of Cook's visit and into the 19th century, early European visitors were always particularly impressed by these boats. Grand canoe hulls were hollowed out from single giant pines as the largest waka could be up to forty meters long or over 130 feet in length. Each part of the process of its creation was highly formulated, from cultivating the supernatural strength of the tree to its felling, preparation, and careful carving that was overseen by chiefly priests and elite tohunga.  

 
 
 

"New Zealand War Canoe bidding defiance to the Ship." A white dog is sitting in mid-center looking up at the man who has both arms outstretched and holds a mere in his left hand. From the British Museum's collection of drawings by A. Buchan, S. Parkinson and J. F. Miller, made in the countries visited by Captain Cook in his first voyage (1768-71), also of prints published in John Hawkesworth's Voy- ages of Biron, Wallis and Cook, 1773, as well as in Cook's second and third voyages (1762-5, 1776-80).

 
 

This is an image of a plate from Captain Cooks's Journal, First Voyage, entitled "War Canoe of New Zealand." Original created in 1769; this facsimile published in 1893.

 
 
 

The Museum's free-standing statue or poutokomanawa is of a type that was once affixed or bound to the central ridge post of a Māori meeting house or wharenui. This figure depicts an important ancestor that represents the continuity of the iwi or tribe, and as a vaunted ancestor — serves as a focal point or axis mundi — to support and anchor the house, its adherents, and their traditions. Ridge pole figures like this one are early. According to Museum notes, this statue was gifted (ca 1825) by Johann Georg Wagler, who is remembered as a talented naturalist and herpetologist. He was tasked by the King of Bavaria, Maximillian-Joseph (1756-1825) to be part of an entourage of scientists to inspect the zoological specimens of museums in Holland, England, and France. One wonders whether this statue entered Wagler's possession on or as a result of this trip or through other zoological contacts. It is a fine figure that most likely dates to the 18th century.

Another Polynesian area, well represented in the Museum's Polynesian holdings, is items from the Marquesas Islands. This aggregation is anchored by an impressive tiki akau. 'Tikiis a Polynesian word that refers to human-like figures, often imbued with Intercessionary, supernatural qualities. This statue was once owned by Karl von den Steinen, the redoubtable explorer, researcher, and scholar, who, among his many accomplishments, included those stemming from his research in the Marquesas islands. (See: https://www.artoftheancestors.com/blog/oceania-humboldt-forum). This tiki akau, while of typical Marquesan form at 142 cm, or nearly 56 inches tall, has a large presence coupled with its winsome expression. Another von den Steinen sourced item is a fine crown or pa'e kea that was collected in situ between 1896 and 1898. These well-known chiefly coronets are composed of flattened concave plates of carved tortoiseshell decorated with well-executed renderings of tiki and stylized crabs; interspaced with mirroring plates of a white clam shell (tridacna), mother-of-pearl, plant fiber, and fine sennet cordage. Throughout Polynesia, a person's head was considered sacred or tapu (the source of our word 'taboo') as this is the site of an important person's mana or prestige.  

The Marquesan items are rounded out by the decorated head from a warrior's club known as an u'u and two intriguing stilt steps. Unlike the Māori stiltstep, which is generally associated with ritual planting, among the Marquesans, stilts were used in jousting during the funeral rites of important persons. As a competitive exercise, stilting there was said to foster agility, athleticism, rapid tactical response, and spiritual awareness. The stiltstep with its tiki's head rotated 180 degrees from its hunkered stance (as if to say, I can see in all directions) is a fine 18th-century item. This specimen was collected by Georg Heinrich von Langsdorff, who, as a young naturalist and physician, took part in Russia's first circumnavigation of the globe. He visited Nuku Hiva in 1804, where this stiltstep was acquired. Like a number of other items illustrated this month, early collection dates and surviving documentation are sometimes critical to understanding material that, due to its fragile nature, might not have otherwise survived for posterity.

In this vein, one of the most fragile items, and one that is synonymous with many Polynesian island cultures, are their tapa cloths. Made from finely beaten sheets of paper mulberry (Brousssonetia papyrifera), tapa was used in hangings, floor coverings, and clothing and bound to items of sacred meaning and ceremonial use. It has been suggested that as a 'supertree,' the mulberry is perhaps the most transported fiber crop in prehistory. Paper mulberry not only produces finely textured bark cloth but also provides edible food, wood for carving utensils, rich yellowish dyes, excellent fibrous rope, unguents, laxatives, and other efficacious medicines. Often referred to and revered as 'canoe plants,' the mulberry accompanied the ancestors of early Polynesians on their great voyages of exploration throughout the vast Pacific. In its varied forms and usages, tapa was, and still is in many ways, a powerful expression of Polynesia's material culture and island identity. If the finest figurative renderings found on tapa are arguably from Lake Sentani in Papua (See: https://www.artoftheancestors.com/blog/bark-cloth-island-southeast-asia, illustrations 18-22), the most ethereal of all compositions, whether painted or stamped, can be said to come from Polynesia.

Space, harmony, and varying rhythms, a way of seeing the world from the vantage point of being on small islands, mere flecks amid the world's largest body of water, compositionally inform the spirit of some early Polynesian tapa. Two tapa have been selected from the museum's collection to illustrate this accomplishment. The first is a finely drawn tapa (Siapo mamanu) from Samoa that uses rectangles with four rows of lanceolated ellipses with off-setting panels that depict finely-painted structures, like the veins on a leaf. These are in turn bound by undulating curves, like tidal lines or wavelengths that give this piece a remarkable sense of calmness and movement in equal expression within the same composition. The museum's notes on a gorgeous poncho from Pitcairn Island (of Mutiny on the Bounty fame) are also interesting as this piece, along with a number of other items, were given to the Bavarian King, Maximilian, in 1821 by Georg Langsdorff, who had circumnavigated the globe between 1803-1806.

There are a number of important figurative items in this edition that include an excellent example of moai kava, a hanging statue from Easter Island that was collected before 1825, along with another one of Polynesia's memorable forms in the top of a god staff (atua rakau) from Raratonga in the Cook Island chain. The latter is said to depict 'gods and their human descendants." The center of these staffs could measure from two and a half feet to sixteen feet long. At the end of each pole is a phallus with a plain wooden shaft that was wrapped and bundled many times over in sheets of fine tapa cloth.

The final entries for this month are two of Polynesia's more iconic items. Among the masterpieces in this collection is a figure described by John Williams of the London Missionary Society (LMS) in the 1820s as a "Fisherman's God." Crouching, well-haunched, wooden images with protruding bellies, male appendages, and bold faces were said to have been placed prior to a fishing expedition in the front space of a vessel where the prow's aft, side thwarts, and gunnels merge. Before setting off, the deity would be festooned with colorful, flowery offerings and prayers. Only 7 of these have survived from the period of conversion. This is most likely an 18th, or perhaps very early 19th-century statue. It possesses distinctive oval-eyed facial features that are associated with the Island of Rarotonga. According to the Museum's notes: "The figure was purchased in London in 1825 by the zoologist Georg Wagler on behalf of the Bavarian King." It is one of the oldest Polynesian works in the collection that "may have come from the collection of the wealthy private scholar, Joseph Banks, who had acquired many objects from Oceania." Banks collected items on his own as he took part in Captain Cook's first voyage (1768-1771) to the Pacific and from other travelers to these distant and newly discovered islands.

 
 
 

Banknote 10$ NZD
Cook Islands
Before 2015
Paper
Michaela Appel Purchase 2014-12-18
2015-64-3
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Regina Stumbaum

Coin 1$ NZD
Cook Islands
Dating 1972
Copper-nickel alloy
Personal Gift 2015-06-22
2015-41-17
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Regina Stumbaum

 
 
 

While significantly different in style from the Rarotongan "fisherman's god", the museum also stewards another statue from the Cook Islands. It's in an effigy, a unique survivor from the island of Aitutaki. Standing at about two feet tall (58.5 cm), this presumed female deity has a jutting gaze and clear double-etched in eyes. Her hands rest placidly across an extended stomach. Most impressively, it's her tattoos, composed of painted horizontal and vertical lines of varying lengths, cross-hatches, triangles, and T-shaped markings that one immediately notes. Her buttocks are also unusually marked as she is inked from head to foot. The best record of a related tattoo format from that time would be the engraving of the Rarotongan chief, (ariki) Te Po, by George Baxter from a sketch made by John Williams, who had converted the population to Christianity in 1821. The engraving depicts the great ariki wearing a complex headdress while holding a fan and a long multi-pronged spear. His ink is composed of equidistantly spaced horizontal lines that appear to merge as chevrons. On his knees are carefully placed turtles, a food reserved only for chiefs. It is said that such markings and tattoos helped to navigate the natural elements, i.e., the sun, the stars, and the ocean, as a mariner might do while setting his sail at sea. For a more in-depth review of the history of this particular statue and the role of the LMS in the Cook Islands, please see Michaela Appel's Female Figures from Aitutaki: Traces of Genealogy and Descent (https://www.artoftheancestors.com/blog/female-figures-aitutaki-michaela-appel).

Between the river Isar and the Alps, Munich is a beautiful city with a long presence of fine art, architecture, culture, and science. Among its numerous charms is the Museum Fünf Kontinente's collection, which contains many gems.

Steven G. Alpert, founder of Art of the Ancestors

 
 
 

1

 
 

Figurative Tinder Box | Pouaka

 
 

Figurative Tinder Box | Pouaka
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Marietta Weidner

 
 

Before 1929

Aotearoa

Maori

Wood, mother of pearl

Hans Meyer

Purchased in 1935

35-4-2 a

 
 

2

 
 

Figurative Container

 

Figurative Container
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Marietta Weidner

 
 

Before 1929

Aotearoa

Maori

Wood, mother of pearl

Previously owned by Hans Meyer

Purchased in 1933

33-20-1

 
 
 

3

 
 

Anthropomorphic Pendant | Hei-Tiki

 

Anthropomorphic Pendant | Hei-Tiki
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Nicolai Kästner

 
 

Before 1841

Aotearoa

Maori

Greenstone, sealing wax

Previously owned by Christophe-Augustin Lamarepicquot

Royal household estate, 1843

L-893

 
 
 

4

 
 

Eel Pendant | Koropepe

 

Eel Pendant | Koropepe
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Nicolai Kästner

 
 

Before 1953

Aotearoa

Maori

Nephrite, sealing wax

Previously owned by Ludwig Bretschneider

Purchased in 1953

53-7-1

 
 

5

 
 

Figure from a Poutokomanawa

 
 

Figure from a Poutokomanawa
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Marietta Weidner

 
 

Before 1825?

Aotearoa

Maori

Wood

Previously owned by Georg Wagler

Gifted around 1825

2812

 
 

6

 
 

Stern Decoration of a Warboat | Tauarapa

 
 

Stern Decoration of a Warboat | Tauarapa
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Nicolai Kästner

 
 

Before 1891

Aotearoa

Maori

Wood, red pigment

Fenton & Sons / Fenton Ltd. / S.G. Fenton Ltd.
Purchased in 1891

91-340

 
 

7

 
 

Spear Thrower | Kotaha

 

Spear Thrower | Kotaha
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Nicolai Kästner

 

Before 1821

Aotearoa

Maori

Casuarina wood

Johann Georg Wagler
Royal household estate 1827

728

 
 
 

8

 
 

Footrest from a Digging Spade | Teka

 
 

Footrest from a Digging Spade | Teka
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Marietta Weidner

 

Before 1863

Aotearoa

Maori

Wood; patina

Novara Museum

Acquisition circumstances unknown

976

 
 
 

9

 
 

Bark Cloth Tapa | Siapo Mamanu

 
 

Bark Cloth Tapa | Siapo Mamanu
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Alexander Laurenzo

 
 

Before 1914

Vaiala, Upolu, Samoa

Bark pulp, pigments

Carl Marquardt
Purchased in 1915

15-16-15

 
 

10

 
 

Headdress of a Taupou | Tuiga

 
 

Headdress of a Taupou | Tuiga
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Marietta Weidner

 
 

Before 1895

Faleata, Upolu, Samoa

Strands of hair, feathers, bark cloth, shells, snails, leather, wood, brass rod with round plate (outer side) at crown height, 4 metal clips

Magumagu
Carl Marquardt
Purchased in 1915

15-16-67

 
 
 

11

 
 

Tortoiseshell Crown | Pa'e kea / Pa'e kaha

 
 

Tortoiseshell Crown | Pa'e kea / Pa'e kaha
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Nicolai Kästner

 

Before 1898

Hakaui, Nukuhiva, Marquesas

Tridacna, tortoiseshell, mother-of-pearl, coconut fiber

Karl von den Steinen
Museum für Völkerkunde Berlin
Johann Friedrich Gustav (II)
Circulation Exchange 1934-02-26

34-6-1

 
 
 
 

12

 
 

Stilt Step | Vaeake / Tapuvae Toko

 

Stilt Step | Vaeake / Tapuvae Toko
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Nicolai Kästner

 
 

Before 1804

Marquesas

Wood, patina

Georg Heinrich Baron von Langsdorff
Royal household estate 1821

188

 

13

 
 

Stilt Step | Vaeake / Tapuvae Toko

 

Stilt Step | Vaeake / Tapuvae Toko
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Marietta Weidner

 
 

Before 1841

Marquesas

Wood, pigments

Christophe-Augustin Lamarepicquot
Royal household estate 1843

L-883

 
 
 

14

 
 

Warrior Club | U’u

 

Warrior Club | U’u
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Marietta Weidner

 
 

Before 1841

Marquesas

Ironwood (Casuarina)

Christophe-Augustin Lamarepicquot
Royal household estate 1843

L-898

 
 
 

15

 
 

Tiki Figure | Tiki Akau

 

Tiki Figure | Tiki Akau
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Nicolai Kästner

 
 

Before 1929

Nukuhiva, Marquesas

Wood, patina

Karl von den Steinen
Arthur Speyer
Museum für Völkerkunde Berlin
Tausch 1951-06-16

51-21-1

 
 
 

16

 
 

Figure of a Male Spirit Being | Moai Kavakava

 

Figure of a Male Spirit Being | Moai Kavakava
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Nicolai Kästner

 
 

Before 1825

Easter Island

Wood, mother of pearl

Johann Georg Wagler
Royal household estate, 1825

193

 
 

17

 
 

Staff God | Atua Rakau

 

Staff God | Atua Rakau
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Marietta Weidner

 
 

Before 1841

Rarotonga, Cook Islands

Wood

Christophe-Augustin Lamarepicquot
Royal household estate 1843

L-900

 
 

18

 
 

“Fisherman’s God” — Figure of a Supernatural Being

 

“Fisherman’s God” — Figure of a Supernatural Being
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Marietta Weidner

 
 

Before 1825

Rarotonga, Cook Islands

Wood

Johann Georg Wagler
Royal household estate 1827

191

 
 

19

 
 

Female Deity Figure

 

Female Deity Figure
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Marietta Weidner

 
 

Before 1825

Aitutaki, Cook Islands

Wood, pigments

Johann Georg Wagler
Royal household estate 1827

190

 
 

20

 
 

Bark Cloth Poncho | Tiputa

 

Bark Cloth Poncho | Tiputa
© Museum Fünf Kontinente, Marietta Weidner

 
 

Before 1825

Pitcairn

Bark from the breadfruit tree ('uru) and paper mulberry (aute)

Georg Heinrich Baron von Langsdorff
Royal household estate 1821

131

 
 
 
 

All artworks and images presented in this feature are the property of Museum Fünf Kontinente. 
© Museum Fünf Kontinente