Lidded Bowl, Marquesas Islands

Reportedly Linden-Museum, Stuttgart
Mathias Komor, New York (inv. no. 1.187)
Nelson A. Rockefeller, New York, acquired from the above
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (inv. no. 1979.206.1815ab), donated by the above
Sotheby's, New York, November 14, 1980, lot 78, consigned by the above
Abraham Rosman and Paula Rubel, New York, acquired at the above auction

Fine Arts Gallery of San Diego, Dimensions of Polynesia, October 7 - November 25, 1973

Jehanne Teilhet-Fisk, Dimensions of Polynesia, San Diego, 1973, p. 232, cat. no. VI.19 (listed)

After visiting the Marquesas Islands in 1791, the French explorer and hydrographer Charles Pierre Claret Fleurieu described the decorated bowls he saw as "various wooden vessels which they make use of for their food, and on which they amuse themselves in carving or engraving figures of men, fishes, and birds" (Kjellgren and Ivory, Adorning the World: Art of the Marquesas Islands, New York, 2005, p. 109). The present lot represents a later 19^th century development of this tradition, and exhibits what looks at first to be repeated geometric patterns. Upon closer examination, however, one may note what looks to be a stylized lizard, its arms and legs extended into rectangular spirals. Lot 26, however, is covered in more immediately recognizable motifs, such as tiki faces with gaping mouths. The most common types of wood used to make Marquesan bowls were tou (false ebony), temanu, and mi'o (Pacific rosewood).