1924.58.34

Collection type

Object

Description

Mask. Face of wood, with broad nose, slightly open broad mouth, and two-plane forehead; painted white, red/brown, and black.

Long description

Mask. Face of wood, with broad nose, slightly open broad mouth, and two-plane forehead; painted white, red/brown, and black. On each cheek a relief carving of a fish painted brown/red; above each eye, an area painted brown/red enclosing five bands of white triangles. Teeth painted as wide triangles. Opercula for eyes. Fibre crest on top and bands of barkcloth and other materials at sides.

Geographical reference

Papua New Guinea

Oceania > Melanesia > Papua New Guinea

Person

Field collector George Brown

PRM source Trustees of the Bowes Museum

PRM source Bowes Museum

Date / Period

Date made: Before 1908

Date collected

By 1908

Acquisition information

Exchanged: 1924

Materials and processes

Material Wood Plant, Material Pigment, Material Plant Fibre, Material Bark Cloth Textile Plant, Material Operculum Shell, Material Plant Seed, Process Carved, Process Painted, Process Beaten, Process Covered

Dimensions

Length: max 550 mm approx

Object numbers

Accession number: 1924.58.34 Other numbers: George Brown 156

Research and responses

The Reverend George Brown retired from the missionary service in 1908, so it may be assumed with fair certainty that all the items in his collection were obtained by then. No doubt it would be possible to establish more exact dates of collection for individual objects from the primary and secondary literature relating to him and his collection (see entry on Biographies database for more information). [JC 23 3 2001]

According to Michael Gunn (Associate Curator, Oceanic Art, the Saint Louis Art Museum), this is NOT a tatanua mask. In an e-mail dated 26 March 2001 concerning the possible loan of this piece for an exhibition, Gunn wrote: 'I don't think it's a tatanua.... I don't exactly know where this type is from - but they form a distinct grouping. My guess is that they are from somewhere south of where the malagan region is today, possibly from the foothills around the Lelet Plateau - a related style of mask which I found in Dresden and another in Leipzig had a painted design around the jaw line of the mask which was painted by the same hand as the guy that painted several uli figures.' Gunn also supplied details of his notes on the piece: 'broad-nosed white-faced mask, similar to the one in the army museum in Madrid. This one has a 2-planed forehead, like a ship’s prow - ‘swimming fish viewed from above’ pattern in brown/red painted engraving, one on each cheek region; no European materials. A group of 5 bands of white triangles on brown/red, one group above each eye, in eyebrow region. Central fibre crest in a fence, bands of various materials on sides - incl. painted barkcloth; slightly open broad mouth; possibly quite similar to the one featured in Krämer 1925: Taf. 75'; as well as details of comparable pieces known to him. [JC 27 3 2001]

Associated publications

Illustrated in black and white in unnumbered plate facing page 172 of George Brown, D.D. Pioneer Missionary and Explorer: An Autobiography - A Narrative of Forty-Eight Years’ Residence and Travel in Samoa, New Britain, New Ireland, New Guinea, and the Solomon Islands, by George Brown (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1908). [JC 23 3 2001] Illustrated in black and white at the far right of plate 'Carved Masks and Figures from New Guinea' opposite page 238 of Melanesians and Polynesians: Their Life-Histories Described and Compared, by George Brown (London: Macmillan, 1910). [JC 26 3 2001] For an account of the New Ireland component of the collections made by George Brown, including this object, see 'New Ireland, Old Objects: Negotiating Colonial Relations through Collections from 1875 to 1885', by Vicky Barnecutt (Oxford: University of Oxford, D.Phil. thesis, 2018). This object is listed on page 385 as number GB275 in Barnecutt's database. [JC 24 9 2018]

Search terms: Mask, Dance, Figure, Dance Accessory, Fish Figure