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Ben Widener

6/2/2016

11 Comments

 
"​Explain how differences in environment, including available resources, affect the nature of the visual arts in the Pacific. Include architectural forms and body adornment in your answer." This particular project will focus on the resources and procedures put into art forms of Polynesian culture, focusing more on architecture and clothing.
  The people who settled the remote islands of Polynesia developed distinctive culture but retained linguistic common ground due to their origin. In their religion it was believed that an individual's geneology could be traced to their ancestral god who was the source of their spiritual power.
In Polynesian culture, all art was sacred and their creation in and of itself was an art. Master artists would also perform special religious rituals with abjects made of limited, yet special materials such as Jadeite from New Zealand. Some of these abjects held their own "mana" or spiritual power and had practical uses. Regardless of the art form, quality and beauty, as well as function, was held most sacred as objects were meant to endure and be passed down through generations.

​TAPA
One art form of polynesia were the woven Tapa mats.this "bark cloth is also called siapo on islands such as Samoa and were usually made by women. Since material for weaving is not in abundance, the brak for these mats is taken solely from the inner bark of the paper mulberry tree. The bark is then beaten with a wooden mallet until it fits a degree of softness acceptable for the weaving process.When completed, Tapa were decorated by men and women using berry dye to produce intricate patterns for clothing, ship sails, housing, and even rituals where dead bodies were wrapped up.

HOUSING
Prior to European contact, polynesian families lived in houses of limited palm trunk and woven reed ceilings which were tall triangular prisms. These houses were built on rectangular platforms in shallow water or land. Groups of houses known as Hamlets were often scattered around the village. These Hamlets often each had their own gardens or fruit trees within a close vicinity. The height of the house platform symbolized social status with lower classes having houses only a few inches off the ground and warrior priests having houses potentially feet off the ground on stones weighing hundreds of pounds each. Overall, the special culture of the polynesians that developed in the resource scarce pacific translated into a very distinct architectural style.
​
STATUE
In polynesian culture, the head priest or chief of a village would use his sacred idol, or Atua, as a mean to communicate or pray to the gods. The Atua was always taken with the chief during migration and was used to found new villages and set up designated shrine areas. These statues were often intricately carved and served as the focus point of a village. They were only carved of volcanic rock since it is the only resource that was available to the polynesians, further supporting the adaptation of their culture to scarcity.




Picture
Residential Polynesian Hut, 30'x20'x27' 6 3/4", cane poles and woven roof
Picture
Woven Tapa showing the fabrication of Tapa, 32"x20", barkcloth, Fiji
Picture
Marquesas Islands, French Polynesia Stone figure 19th century, Musée du quai Branly, Paris
Picture
1914 fale Samoa, 24'x 15' 7" credit of National Library of New Zealand
​CONNECTIONS
-Ancient Aegean Cultures
 Like ancient Pacific cultures, ancient Aegean civilizations were relatively isolated which lead to certain materials to be used repeatedly in art. An example of this can be seen in cycladic sculpture as all figures are made of marble or, rarely, terra cotta. The isolation of the Cycladic, Minoan, and Mycenaean cultures forced them to adapt and create unique art and culture like that of the Pacific.


Picture
2600–2400 B.C. Cycladic fermale figure, Marble, H. 24 3/4 in. (62.79 cm)
-Contemporary
 In contemporary times, pacific art festivals are held annually on various islands due to advancements in transportation technology. These festivals celebrate past and present art and culture of the pacific with a variety of art forms coming from many Islands. Some artists imitate the resources and methods used by their ancestors while others use more original methods to create sculptures out of a single type of modern resource such as plastic. This imitates the limitations on resources that existed in the ancient pacific.


Picture
Polynesian dance group, Polynesian Art Festival 2015, traditional garments with modern cotton/nylon, 48" x 24"
​VIDEO
This video offers a thorough history of human settlement in the Pacific Islands. The video does not specifically cover art (one will be added later which does) but does include how the limited resources of the region shaped civilization.
BIBLIOGRPHY
"Khan Academy." Khan Academy. Accessed April 25, 2016. https://www.khanacademy.org/test-prep/ap-art-history/the-pacific.

Kirch, P.V. "Monumental Architecture and Power in Polynesian Chiefdoms: A Comparison of Tonga and Hawaii." Taylor & Francis. Taylor Francis Online Journals, n.d. Web. 19 May 2016.

Kjellgren, Eric. "Oceania: Art of the Pacific Islands in The Metropolitan Museum of Art | MetPublications | The Metropolitan Museum of Art." Oceania: Art of the Pacific Islands in The Metropolitan Museum of Art | MetPublications | The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2007. Web. 15 May 2016.
​
Stokstad, Marilyn. "Art of Pacific Cultures: Chapter 28." Art History. 5th ed. Upper Saddle River: Pearson Education, 2014. 861-79. Print.
11 Comments
Campbell Wharton
6/6/2016 05:33:53 pm

I really like how you presented this amount of information all together. It reads sort of like the textbook, but I guess if the textbook wasn't horribly boring. The arrangement of pictures alongside the text was really cool, I didn't actually know you could do that. Also nice on connecting to not only a period we studied but connecting to a specific piece we studied as well. Great job!

Reply
Josie Ladle
6/8/2016 01:56:09 pm

I really, really appreciate how condensed this post is. You presented a ton of information in a really nice format - the pictures down the side with the text next to it is great for quick referencing, and everything is really easy to follow. I wish my post looked more like yours, not gonna lie.

Reply
Lyla Rossi
6/9/2016 09:23:52 pm

I really enjoyed reading this, because it's a prime example of form equalling function, and somewhere along the way, that became art. This concept really reminds me of the Aesthetic Movement, which predominated in the US I think mostly, where people began to adopt the philosophy "art for art's sake." This movement incorporated art in every aspect of daily life, but mostly they began to decorate and furnish their houses with art, paying much more attention to interior design because they wanted to surround themselves with artistic beauty, and artists wanted to bring their art to the middle classes to enjoy on a daily basis. I guess this project is almost an inversion of that, which is pretty cool.

Reply
Erin Paasch
6/9/2016 11:41:46 pm

This topic is very intriguing, and you did a great job getting it all into one post. Environmental factors were especially unique in this region, and you show the relationship between art and environment so smoothly.

Reply
Alex Norman
6/9/2016 11:44:46 pm

Nice job Ben! I think it was really cool how you chose to really explore the impact of a society's natural materials on their art production. The video you included was also quite interesting. Ethnobotany seems like such a fascinating field and one I really had not give much though to until now. It's curious to see how within different societies the development of new technologies/materials can either have a huge impact on all aspects of day to day life or have very little change on a group of people content with their traditions.

Reply
Ishani Pendse
6/10/2016 01:12:19 am

I really liked your topic and also appreciated how the information was laid out in such an easy to read format. I also really liked the brief lessons into various ways of living. Great job!

Reply
Evelyn
6/10/2016 08:31:22 am

Great job jumping into pacific culture! Your piece really shows good research and I am joyed your parallel back to the Cycladic figurines. I found all burking on my project that the links between early cultures, intriguingly, are quite easy to make which says something about humans and our movement through time.

Reply
Alix Elizabeth
6/10/2016 08:57:14 am

I really enjoyed learning about the tapa mats of Polynesian art culture, especially that they used berry-based dye to design them! Also it was really an interesting connexion to the Cycladic figurine we studied first semester, plus the modern Polynesian dance tradition. Really great job!

Reply
Helena Trevor
6/10/2016 09:44:42 am

I love how you explored how an environment can influence the kind of art made - sometimes we don't think about how regions can be limited or inspired by their resources. I also like how you connected them with the Aegean cultures that also used what resources they had, even when the stone broke easily. They adapted to their surroundings in art as well as in their way of life. Really cool post!

Reply
Ellie Kim
6/10/2016 09:50:36 am

I loved reading about the Polynesian Tapa. It was super interesting for me to compare it to the designs on the Kosode. While the embroidery on the Kosodes was reminiscent of nature and symmetry, the Tapas had images of clothing, ship sails, housing, and even rituals where dead bodies were wrapped up. And you can go even further to compare the Polynesian depiction of clothing the Greek depiction of clothing that I also talked about in my post. Even though the Greeks depicted clothing more in sculpture form, and the Polynesians depicted it in their tapestries, it is still interesting to look at how different cultures portray what they wear.




Reply
Sophia Mccrimmon
6/14/2016 02:47:56 pm

It is so crazy and cool how the height of the Polynesian houses indicated status in society. It's interesting to think about the ways that that's been the case in the domestic dynamics of a bunch of other cultures, like on Downton Abbey how all the servants live downstairs below the wealthy elites.

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