ART IN PAPUA

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22628, 16 January 1937, Page 14

ART IN PAPUA

THE WAYWARD NATIVE FACETIOUS SCIENTIST EDUCATIONAL SETBACKS A departure from the usually sober style of scientific papers was made in one supplied as a contribution to the series on native education by Mr. F. I'l. Williams, Government anthropologist for the territory of Papua, it was written in a lively and at times colloquial fashion, and contained some amusing passages.

"We have exercised ourselves —and quit-e rightly so —about the native s character and morals, about his beliefs and thinking powers —with perhaps too much relative emphasis on the former —- and about his creature comforts and his capacity as a labourer," stated Mr. Williams. "Hut we have so iar, 1 suggest, paid too little attention to him as an artist. Now since artistry is unpredictable and artists are so unmanageable. can we really do anything about it? Why not leave the native artists to look after themselves? They have done pretty well in the past, so why not in the future? J think, notwithstanding those rhetorical questions, that native art is likely to have a thin time t>f it under the stress of contact and change." Briar Pipes and Football Jerseys Native self-determination in the realms of art and craftsmanship did not always load in a direction that educators thought desirable, the writer continued. "If we respect the native's liberty we must not be too keen to make up his mind for him. If he prefers an enamelled bilfyean to an earthenware pot, or a stubby briar pipe to a handsomely decorated bamboo sinoking-tube, we may deplore the results aesthetically and regret the decay of some admirable crafts, but there is certainly no sound reason for trying to perpetuate the old ways merely because they are old." Mr. Williams regretted that the native found so much pleasure in abandoning his old methods of personal adornment in favour of "t.Jje shirts, coats, singlets, trousers and felt hats which constitute our own singularly ugly male attire. And. regrettable as it, may bo, there is little doubt that he thinks he looks nice in thorn. Worse still, he may win general admiration by sporting a football jersov with horizontal stripes of rod and white, fortunately in Papua the wearing of body clothes is discouraged, so that one does not often have to endure such mental Traumata, hut I have even seen a hoy wearing a singlet of blinding magenta. " Self-determination Be Hanged!"

! "Now what is one to do in the mattor? The course which would suggest itself to the more impulsive of us would be to cry, 'Self-determination be hanged!', to tear the singlet off his back and stamp on it. But then the boy likes it, and there are always some traders unscrupulous enough to sell striped or even magenta singlets. We cannot very well punish either of them simply for the choice of pattern and colour. The ideal course. I presume, is to educate the native up to the point of realising that, in the total surroundings. stripes and magenta simply don't go. That is. of course, presuming they don't. Some modernists might say that they do; but from them—if such there be —1 take refuge in the proverb i)e gustibus' —and beat a hasty retreat." Dodo's Tail Feathers Tn condemning the activities of museum and other collectors who bought and removed from villages objects of art. Mr. Williams said that such people did a grave disservice to native art and even to ethnology. "Surely one live dodo would be of more value to science than any amount of tail fathers from a dead one." It was regrettable in one way that the motives behind certain forms of art no longer had free play. One tribe, for example, had produced beautifully painted arrows meant for human victims only, and never for game. In another area were found the best oxa moles of plastic art., at once lifelike and grotest(|ue, in the clay-modelled faces of relatives' skulls exhumed from the grave. But the practice of exhumation would probably decline, as it -was already doing under missionary influence. and so another kind of art would go with it. Tourist Trade Planned The manufacture of the nstoutidingly effective masks used in the secret ceremonies of the Gulf Division rested on the continuance of the ceremonies themselves, and these at the moment were struggling against the adverse influence of the native pastor. The Mot.uan wood-carvers were largely out of work because the elaborate "dubu," or ceremonial feast-platforms, on which they formerly exercised their skill, were virtually prohibited to Christians. in conclusion, Mr. Williams described a plan now under consideration for teaching native arts and crafts in the village schools with the assistance of local craftsmen. He said that he was in favour of introducing the commercial motive, with the safeguard that only really good work should be sold. It: was hoped to establish at the capital. Port Moresby, a salesroom in conjunction with a museum. This, it was certain, would lead to many purchases bv tourists.

METEORIC SHOWER SPECIMENS DISPLAYED That stones sometimes fall from ihe heavens was brought graphically before delegates to the Science Congress yesterday, when a number of Australian meteorites were exhibited before the geology section Irv Miss J. Bedford, of the Kyaneutta Museum, South Australia. The meteoric fall from which the specimens were recovered occurred near 31 on bury, in the heart of Central Australia. On the site of the fall there are 10 distinct craters, ranging in diameter from 200 yds to 10yds, the results of the terrific explosive force gencrated on the impact. Among the hundreds of meteorites discovered in the region the largest specimen weighed a-quarter of a ton and it is estimated that the mass which caused the principal crater must have weighed 400 tons.

MEMBERSHIP RULES

PERIODICAL PLANNED A reorganisation of the constitution so as to allow of regular annual membership instead of the present system of members joining for each biennial meeting was decided on by the general council of the Australian and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science at a meeting yesterday. It was resolved to publish a periodical of similar type to the Knglish journal, Nature. it was also decided to agree to the reorganisation of the Australian National Research Council so that if will in future carry on its work as a committee of the association instead of as an individual body as it has clone since 1921. Thp Research Council agreed to this action as far as it was concerned at a meeting in Sydney early this month.