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Coaxing the Spirits to Dance: Art of the Papuan Gulf

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Enlarge Spirit Board (kwoi)
Papuan Gulf, Purari area, Maipua Village
Wood, pigments; 41 x 16 x 3 in. (104.1 x 40.6 x 7.6 cm)
Tomkins Collection

We no longer have documentation about where this board was made and used, but another kwoi in this exhibition with nearly identical designs was photographed by the anthropologist A. B. Lewis in 1912 at Maipua Village, allowing us to infer that this board probably came from the same clan and presumably from the same community. Photographs made during the early period of outside contact are critical to our understanding of the artistic styles, and social and physical contexts, of these boards.

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