Male ritual figure "malum" · Papua New Guinea, Abelam · ID: 3033710
Thomas E.J. Klasen, Berlin, Germany
Description
wood, painted with red and yellow ochre, black and white pigment, crowned by a hornbill depicted in a nearly naturalistic manner, painted with bracelets and the typical breast ornament of cymbium shell (faintly visible), slightly dam., missing parts, crack (beard), paint rubbed off, traces of old age, rep. (beak of the hornbill), on metal plate;
presumably depicting a male ancestor, the hornbill representing a clan emblem. Some resemblances to the yams ghost “wapinyan”, but decisive attributes missing: the symbolic depiction of the black cockatoo on the shoulders, net-like ornaments on the body and the bush chicken between the legs.
The object Male ritual figure “malum” with the object ID 3033710 was last part of the auction 71st tribal art auction at November 24, 2012 on Zemanek-Münster Auction house. The object with the lot number 46 achieved a sales price of EUR 1,000.
You can find more Figures and other popular object types on our related topic pages. You may also be interested in our page on Oceanian art.
Comparing literature
Lippisches Landesmuseum Detmold (Hg.), Abelam, Detmold 1989, p. 40 f.