The appeal of New Guinea's art lies in the people's extraordinary resourcefulness and creativity. For centuries, they have made objects in order to communicate with the spirit world. Many pieces, based on myths and ancient religious themes, stand comparison with the world's great sculptural masterpieces. Some were made in response to health, fertility or rites of passage; others signified individual stature in a village, invoked the end of a mourning ritual, or warded off evil and sickness. Everyday objects were just as carefully crafted, including house posts, dishes, canoes or shields. The range of media reflects the natural resources available to the New Guinean: shell, rock, feathers, bone, wood, bark, cloth, sago-leaf, nuts and seeds, human hair, and brilliant colours from natural pigments. Although these objects were never intended to last beyond their immediate function, they have in fact survived for hundreds, sometimes thousands, of years. The arts of New Guinea have been little known to Western audiences for centuries, partly for geographical reasons. New Guinea is a remote island the size of France and Italy combined, just east of Indonesia and north of Australia in the South Pacific. The terrain is mountainous with coastal lowlands, and the climate is aggressively humid and prone to monsoon rains. Almost a thousand languages are spoken on the island, and it is home to a variety of distinct cultures and art styles. This elegantly presented two-volume publication depicts the art of New Guinea in richer detail than ever before. It is a detailed and broad-based survey, drawn from the Jolika Collection of John and Marcia Friede - the world's foremost private collection. Volume I contains the lavish selection of magnificent colour plates. Volume II features three essays by noted scholars and an extensive, illustrated catalogue section by John Friede. Publication will coincide with the reopening in autumn 2005 of the newly renovated de Young Museum in San Francisco, an institution with a strong commitment to the arts of the South Pacific. With John and Marcia Friede's generous gift of the collection, the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco will become the United State's leading centre for the study and preservation of New Guinea's art.
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15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Best Show in San Francisco...,
By Giordano Bruno (Wherever I am, I am.) - See all my reviews (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER) (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)
This review is from: New Guinea Art: Masterpieces of the Jolika Collection (Hardcover)
... is the Jolika Collection of the art of New Guinea in the new De Young Museum, though one could argue in favor of the circus cabaret at Teatro Zinzanni. SF is finally maturing as a museum city, with a world-class collection at the Museum of Modern Art, the most important Asian art collection in the USA in its own museum, a spanky new Jewish Museum, and other unique exhibitions. The Jolika collection was assembled by Marsha and John Friede; you'll find info about them in a previous amazon review.
The art on display includes shields and masks, architectural scultures, decorated weapons, textiles, and bizarre objects of practical use that have more beauty in their making than one can explain by any theory of utility. Most of the materials are wood, shell, and plant fibers, though the display includes a case of pre-historic stone sculptures. Items range circa 1500 to 1920 c.e. The lighting is excellent, the labels are visible and up-to-date, and the whole museum is graceful in its lay-out. I seldom look at more than one gallery in a local museum on any one visit, but if you're coming from afar, you'll also find very focused and well-selected collections of African art and Middle-American art in the DeYoung. This is a massive tome, this book, or rather two massive tomes in a sturdy box. It's as much as a small person could carry to the corner store. The larger Volume 1 contains full color, full page photographs of every piece in the collection. Volume 2 contains three scholarly essays on the craft, the anthropological significance, and the provenance of the pieces. If you love this art, at $195 used, it's still a worthwhile acquisition.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Stunning,
By
This review is from: New Guinea Art: Masterpieces of the Jolika Collection (Hardcover)
This is an extraordinary combination of large closeup photos of 598 artifacts and descriptions of their origins (time/place) and significance in the varied cultures of New Guinea island in the South Pacific. The photos are extremely sharp -- you can almost smell the objects, which date from prehistoric to 20th century. I lived in Papua New Guinea for 15 years but thought I didn't have time for all of this information right now. I couldn't put the books down. Generally, the objects are presented from province to province in Papua New Guinea (eastern half of the island) and in West Papua (province of Indonesia). A separate map helps you find the various source places.
4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
In New Guinea Art-The Book to Grab if Your Long House is Burning Down,
By
This review is from: New Guinea Art: Masterpieces of the Jolika Collection (Hardcover)
I really dislike cliches, but they are often appropriate. Truly, this is one of the two or three books to buy on the subject of New Guinea art, to grab, if you treasure this topic and need to select a few titles when the proverbial house is burning.
I have know the Friede's since 1971, and I am also a dealer of Oceanic art and I have sold art to them, so I can be accused immediately of writing about a friend's publication and in a field that we both do business in. Nevertheless, I felt compelled to support a work that has been seriously developed over many years and has come to fruition in this publication, along with an extensive exhibition of this art at the new museum building at the De Young Museum in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. The Friede's have never asked me nor suggested that I write a review. It is important for the readers of this publication to try to see the art physically on display, as photographs are still two dimensional and this art is particularly three dimensional. The box set of this collection is comprehensive and should give the reader a better understanding of what New Guinea art is about and the tremendous range of styles that exist in such close roximity. It is supported by fine photographs of some of the most important New Guinea art ever collected, certainly the most important body of work formed in a private collection at present. The Jolika collection does emphasize the Friede's own personal taste as well as define what New Guinea art is. It can be said that in most cases they collected what appears to be the most archaic forms of New Guinea art as well as some of the more important iconographic forms. This is a plaudit not a criticism, since we learn more about all Tribal art forms from the earlier pieces that suffered less from contact from the outside world than those pieces that show more recent evidence of acculturation. This is one of the major reasons to buy these books; nowhere are there so many high quality early pieces illustrated on New Guinea art than here. The Jolika collection publication features fine photography and amazing text to support more precise geographical locations and additional information about the use of the objects and a valuable sampling of carbon analysis which produced a range for dating the time of manufacture for these objects, not previously scientifically proven. At times, I felt I needed to turn the object a quarter turn here or there to see more or to emphasize something I wanted to view. This is probably more to do with my "tweaking" personality than a fault of the photography and this is why I urge the buyers and readers of this book set to buy a ticket to San Francisco to see the objects first hand on view. This boxed set of two books are a bargain at current Amazon pricing.
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