Pacific Island Art Oldest inhabited places on earth. Aboriginals reached Australia 50,000 years ago , But most islands have been inhabited for a short amount of time. 1300 went to Fiji via 2 hulled sail boats. Tonga reached in 420 BCE and Samoa 200BCE. New Zealand in the 10th century. Magellan started the white exploration of the Pacific, implanting customs, religions, Values and technologies. Men and women with clear roles in the arts. Men carved and made maps. Women made pottery and wove, and made bark cloth, tapa. They were soaked and fused by beating and then stenciled

The elite centre was a special place of residence for the nobility and of mortuary activities presided over by priests. Its population almost certainly did not exceed 1,000, and may have been less than half that. Although many of the residents were chiefs, the majority were commoners. Nan Madol served, in part, as a way for the ruling Saudeleur chiefs to organize and control potential rivals by requiring them to live in the city rather than in their home districts, where their activities were difficult to monitor. Madol Powe, the mortuary sector, contains 58 islets in the northeastern area of Nan Madol. Most islets were once occupied by the dwellings of priests. Some islets served a special purpose: food preparation, canoe construction on Dapahu, and coconut oil preparation on Peinering. High walls surrounding tombs are located on Peinkitel, Karian, and Lemenkou, but the most prominent is the royal mortuary islet of Nandauwas, where walls 18–25 feet (5.5–7.6 m) high surround a central tomb enclosure within the main courtyard. This was built for the first Saudeleur.[11] Food and water[edit] had to be brought in by others or created on the mainland.

Image 213.Nan Mandol 700- 1600 , basalt bolders, Micronesia Ancient City was capital of Micronesia. 92 islands connected by canals 170 acres in all. Built out onto the water like Venice. Seawalls 15-20 feet tall- 35 ft. thick Canals flushed with tide water. City built to separate the upper and lower classes. King lived near the lower classes to keep and eye on. Curved walls make it look like a boat.

Nan Madol- built on top of a coral reef

Image 217 Female deity 18th 19th century, wood, Micronesia, Nukuoru statues The first Europeans to collect the Nukuoro sculptures found them coarse and clumsy. It is not known whether the breadfruit tree (Artocarpus altilis) images were carved with local adzes equipped with Tridacna shell blades or with western metal blade tools (Tridacna is a genus of large saltwater clams). The surfaces were smoothed with pumice which was abundantly available on the beach. All the sculptures, ranging in size from 30 cm to 217 cm, have similar proportions: an ovoid head tapering slightly at the chin and a columnar neck. The eyes and nose are either discretely shown as slits or not at all. The shoulders slope downwards and the chest is indicated by a simple line. Some female figures have rudimentary breasts. Some of the sculptures, be they male, female or of indeterminate sex, have a sketchy indication of hands and feet. The buttocks are always flattened and set on a flexed pair of legs. Kept in religious buildings. Represent deities. Sometimes dressed. Abstraction. Chin pointed to face; no facial features. Horizontal lines indicate the knees, waist, neck eyes- influenced abstract artists of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Navigation Charts in Micronesia- Marshall Islands Image 221 19th – 20th centuries, wood and fiber Charts composed to get to a location and memorized. Diagonals depict the wind and tides. Shells indicate the islands. Charts are water proof. Used to train pilots as well. The Marshall Islands in eastern Micronesia consist of thirty-four coral atolls consisting of more than one thousand islands and islets spread out across an area of several hundred miles. In order to maintain links between the islands, the Marshall Islanders built seafaring canoes. These vessels were both quick and manoeuvrable. The islanders developed a reputation for navigation between the islands—not a simple matter, since they are all so low that none can be seen from more than a few miles away.

Image 216 Ahu ula- the feathered cape from Hawaii- 18th century, feathers and fiber, Museum of the Americas, Madrid Worn by men for protection, 500,000 feathers, 7 usable feathers- each bird, Red was a royal color, coconut fiber as a base with feathers tied to it. British Museum ( Ahu ula means red) 68x45 cm ( 26x 18 inches)

Cook Islands, Staff god. Rarotonga 18th-19th Century- wood, tapa, fiber, feathers British Museum Stood upright in the village center. Large head on top with others underneath it. Elongated body. They varied in size from about 73 cm to nearly four meters, like this rare example. It is made of ironwood wrapped with lengths of barkcloth. The upper part of the staff consists of a carved head above smaller carved figures. The lower end is a carved phallus. Some missionaries removed and destroyed phalluses from carvings, considering them obscene. Reverend John Williams observed of this image that the barkcloth contained red feathers and pieces of pearl shell, known as the manava or spirit of the god. He also recorded seeing the islanders carrying the image upright on a litter. This image was among fourteen presented to Reverend John Williams at Rarotonga in May 1827.  Central section is a roll of tapa. Inside the roll are red feathers and pearl shells which are sacred and are the soul of the god. Most were destroyed by British. Thrown down in front of Christian church to show that there has been a transition.

Image 219 Hiapo tapa from Niue, 1850-1900, bark cloth and freehand or stenciled painting. Bark cloth from mulberry tree. Warn as clothing before cotton was imported. Honor or celebration represented in each. From New Zealand The earliest examples of hiapo were collected by missionaries and date to the second half of the nineteenth century. Niuean ponchos (tiputa) collected during this era, are based on a style that had previously been introduced to Samoa and Tahiti (see example at left). It is probable, however, that Niueans had a native tradition of bark cloth prior to contact with the West. In the 1880s, a distinctive style of hiapo decorations emerged that incorporated fine lines and new motifs. Hiapo from this period are illustrated with complicated and detailed geometric designs. The patterns were composed of spirals, concentric circles, squares, triangles, and diminishing motifs (the design motifs decrease in size from the border to the center of the textile). Niueans created naturalistic motifs and were the first Polynesians to introduce depictions of human figures into their bark cloth. Some hiapo examples include writing, usually names, along the edges of the overall design.

Gender rolls- women weave and make bark cloth,

Image 220 Gottfried Lindauer, Tamati Waka Nene 1890, oil on canvas, Aukland Art Center, New Zealand New Zealand painter – painted the Maori chieftains. Worked on commission. Subject was a convert to Weslyan Faith ( Anglican) Post Humus, Emphasis on rank, the tatoos, staff with an eye, feathers from the hatchet and the greenstone earrings. He was painted from a series of photographs.

Image 222 Malagan Mask or Mallangan or Malanggan Mask from Papau New Guinea, 20th century, wood, pigment, fiber, and shell Send the souls of the dead on their way to the next world Can begin months after deaths an last for months Ceremonies free the living of the dead After ceremonies are left to rot; they are commissioned and are the soul of the person, not the image. Detailed carvings, indications of the clan, and living members of the family. Large hair is hairstyle of the living. Black, yellow and red are colors of violence, war and magic

Malangan figure (detail), 1882-83 C. E Malangan figure (detail), 1882-83 C.E., 122 cm high, wood, vegetable fiber, pigment and shell (turbo petholatus opercula), north coast of New Ireland, Papua New Guinea © Trustees of the British Museum They are symbolic of many important subjects, including identity, kinship, gender, death, and the spirit world. ​They often include representations of fish and birds of identifiable species, alluding both to specific myths and the animal's natural characteristics. For example, at the base of this figure is depicted a rock cod, a species which as it grows older changes gender from male to female. The rock cod features in an important myth of the founding of the first social group, or clan, in this area; thus the figure also alludes to the identity of that clan group.

Image 218 Buk Mask, Torres Strait, 19th Century, turtle shell, wood, feathers, fiber, shell, Metropolitan Museum NY Water passage between Australia and New Guinea. Unique to this region, male initiation ceremony, death or fertility Human form and animal form with bird on top and hair. Pieces stitched together. Dancers in the movements of the bird https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/art-oceania/melanesia/v/buk-torres

Image 218 Fiji mats presented to Queen Elizabeth 1953 Performance Art?????

Image 214 Moai Statuary from Easter Island, basalt 900 statues male all facing inland, 50 tons each, carved in situ Erected onto platforms, above the cremation sites, Persons deified after death, white coral on eyes, hands on bellies, some have top knots.

http://www. smithsonianmag http://www.smithsonianmag.com/videos/category/history/how-were-easter-islands-gigantic-statues-ac/

Michel Tuffery, Pisupo Lua Afe (Corned Beef 2000), 1994, flattened cans of corned beef (Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa Collection) ©Michael Tuffery What can a tin can bull teach us?  Michel Tuffery is one of New Zealand’s best-known artists of Pacific descent, with links to Samoa, Rarotonga and Tahiti. He majored in printmaking at Dunedin’s School of Fine Arts, and describes art quite literally as his first language because he didn’t read, write or speak until he was 6 years old. Encouraged instead to express himself through drawing, he now aims artworks like Pisupo Lua Afe primarily at children, hoping to engage their curiosity and inspire them to care for both their own health and that of the environment.