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Male Chalk Figure
Namatanai District
19th century
Object Place: Namatanai District, New Ireland, Papua New Guinea
Medium/Technique
Limestone, chalk
Dimensions
38.1 cm (15 in.)
Credit Line
Gift of William E. and Bertha L. Teel
Accession Number1994.398
NOT ON VIEW
CollectionsAfrica and Oceania
ClassificationsSeals
ProvenanceMarch 15, 1897, sold by Firma J. F. Umlauff, Hamburg [see note 1], to William Downing Webster (dealer, b. 1868 - d. 1913), London and Bicester, Oxfordshire, England [see note 2]; September 9, 1897, sold by Webster to Lt.-General Augustus Henry Pitt-Rivers (b. 1827 - d. 1900), Farnham, England; probably transferred to the Pitt-Rivers Museum, Farnham [see note 3]; 1966, Pitt-Rivers Museum closed and collection passed by descent to Stella Howson-Clive (Pitt-Rivers), Dorset [see note 4]; November 26, 1979, Stella Pitt-Rivers and others sale, Sotheby’s, London, lot 51, sold. September 27, 1980, sold by Wayne Heathcote Gallery, Paddington, N. S. W., Australia, to William and Bertha Teel, Marblehead, MA; 1994, partial gift of William and Bertha Teel to the MFA; 2014, acquired fully with the bequest of William Teel to the MFA. (Accession Dates: January 26, 1994 and February 26, 2014)
NOTES:
[1] The Umlauff firm established an ethnographic art and artifact business and amassed an extensive collection. It is not known exactly when or how this figure left its original location. Figures of this type were usually destroyed after use; see Christraud M. Geary, ed., From the South Seas: Oceanic Art in the Teel Collection (Boston: MFA, 2006), p. 116, cat. no. 56.
[2] The back of the figure is inscribed "BT WEBSTER / SEP 97 / PI." On September 9, 1897, Webster sold two New Ireland chalk figures to Pitt-Rivers (stock nos.368-369). William Downing Webster stock book, nos. 1-9834 (Museum of New Zealand - Te Papa Tongarewa), entry nos. 368-369 (online).
[3] Augustus Pitt-Rivers established a privately-owned museum in Dorset in 1880, where he housed acquisitions he made between 1880 and 1900. He kept several notebooks recording the collection, now held by Cambridge University. It has not been possible to definitely identify this figure in the Pitt-Rivers notebooks.
[4] The collection of the Pitt-Rivers museum passed by descent to Augustus Pitt-Rivers’s son, Alexander Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers (b. 1855 – d. 1927); then to his son, George Henry Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers (b. 1890- d. 1966) and his common law wife, Stella Howson-Clive Pitt-Rivers. The museum closed in 1966 and portions of the collection were sold.
NOTES:
[1] The Umlauff firm established an ethnographic art and artifact business and amassed an extensive collection. It is not known exactly when or how this figure left its original location. Figures of this type were usually destroyed after use; see Christraud M. Geary, ed., From the South Seas: Oceanic Art in the Teel Collection (Boston: MFA, 2006), p. 116, cat. no. 56.
[2] The back of the figure is inscribed "BT WEBSTER / SEP 97 / PI." On September 9, 1897, Webster sold two New Ireland chalk figures to Pitt-Rivers (stock nos.368-369). William Downing Webster stock book, nos. 1-9834 (Museum of New Zealand - Te Papa Tongarewa), entry nos. 368-369 (online).
[3] Augustus Pitt-Rivers established a privately-owned museum in Dorset in 1880, where he housed acquisitions he made between 1880 and 1900. He kept several notebooks recording the collection, now held by Cambridge University. It has not been possible to definitely identify this figure in the Pitt-Rivers notebooks.
[4] The collection of the Pitt-Rivers museum passed by descent to Augustus Pitt-Rivers’s son, Alexander Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers (b. 1855 – d. 1927); then to his son, George Henry Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers (b. 1890- d. 1966) and his common law wife, Stella Howson-Clive Pitt-Rivers. The museum closed in 1966 and portions of the collection were sold.