New Zealand, 18th Century
Wood and Haliotis shell
25,4 cm

Provenance:
John J. Klejman collection, New York
George and Rosemary Lois collection, New York
Sotheby's, New York, African, Oceanic and Pre-Columbian Art, 15 May 2009, lot 194
Nasser and Co, New York (2011)
Property from a Princely collection

Upoko whakairo, or "carved head”.
Beautiful head with finely engraved full facial moko (tattoo). The high-quality carving and eyes inlaid with Haliotis shell mother of pearl, contrast with the rather rudimentary shape of the head itself. This is typical for the so-called Maori classic period that approximately ended with the first arrival of Captain James Cook in 1769 in New Zealand and the thereupon following influence of European culture. It allows us to tentatively date this sculpture as from the first half of the 18th C. or older. The roughly sculpted top and back of the head, and small holes alongside the face suggest that it was originally covered, likely by hair.
In Maori portraiture, the subject was identified by his moko patterns or facial tattoos, not by physical resemblance. Portrait sculpture or the actual representation of an individual did not occur since the head was considered sacred, and its representation therefore tapu.
This head with a peg at its base was most likely the head figure of a model or funeral canoe. In the collection of the Rautenstrauch-Joest Museum in Cologne (1), we find a complete funeral canoe with a prow in the shape of a head as well, which explains the relatively small size as opposed to a prow sculpture that would have stood on the bow of an actual canoe.In some areas of New Zealand, it was customary to have the bones of a deceased chief exhumed during a special ceremony to be secretly stored in a cave to avoid insult and desecration by enemies. The bones could be stored in canoe-shaped containers, and more precisely war canoes, such as the one from the Cologne Museum. According to T. Barrow (Maori Wood Sculpture of New Zealand, Wellington - Auckland - Sidney - Melbourne, 1969, p.101), such ossuaries developed from the older use of 'boats for the dead'. One of his arguments is the traditional Maori conception of the afterlife: after their death, high-ranking chiefs return by ship to the land of origin of their ancestors who immigrated to New Zealand by means of the Great Fleet, the mythical Hawaiki.(1) Hilke Thode-Arora, Tapa und Tiki. Die Polynesien-Sammlung des Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museums, Cologne, 2001, cat.10, pp.32-34)