Standing male figure ·  Papua New Guinea - Maprik · ID: 3033599

Description

wood, painted with red and yellow ochre, black paint and white pigment, high-towering slender body, crowned by a hornbill, ornamentally painted, dam., cracks (above all backside), paint rubbed off;
representing the Yams spirit “wapinyan” or a male ancestor. The hornbill, an important ancestral head-hunting symbol, presumably alluding to his skill as warrior.

Comparing literature

Koch, Gert, Kultur der Abelam, Berlin 1968, p. 40