Bowl

ClassificationsFurnishings-Serviceware-bowls

Datebefore 20th Century

Collection SiteManus Province, Papua New Guinea

MediumStone

Dimensions6 × 11 × 11 in. (15.2 × 27.9 × 27.9 cm)

Credit LineCollected on behalf of the Bowers Museum by the Roski-Keller-Martin Expeditions 2000-2008

Object number2011.11.11

DescriptionStone mortars and bowls are found throughout the interior of New Guinea, island Melanesia and beyond in places such as Tahiti and New Zealand in Polynesia. This exquisite and shapely bowl from the Admiralty Islands is uncommon and little is known about stone carving from this area.

Stone objects date back to the earliest inhabitants of Melanesia, growing in specialization over time with the evolution of practices like agriculture and hunting. Mortars, pestles, and ceremonial objects that might be hundreds or thousands of years old are rediscovered with some frequency, especially during construction or from tilling soil, and are used or instilled with a newfound spiritual significance. Utilitarian stone tools tend to be undecorated, but pieces created for ceremonial purposes are highly refined—painstakingly pecked and ground to create figurative or abstract geometric forms.

On View

On view