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I'm working on the provenance narratives in very recent sales of Polynesian items right now. Gone are (most) references to "primitivising" assertions (i.e. the headhunting and cannibalism, but I am now seeing a modernised sales pitch that is just as disturbing
My goal here is to understand what kind of stories about colonialism, imperialism, conquest, and violence are used to attract white buyers to Pacific art. Auction catalogues are marketing material and marketing reveals what the sellers, at least, think the buyers want.
A number of the past few objects I've looked at are being sold with stories along the lines of "Oh, no, Europeans came and the cultures that made these items changed because of that...BUT HEY THAT MEANS THIS THING IS SUPPER RARE, RIGHT?" Sigh.
Some quotes: "there was a sense that the pre-colonial culture on the island was irrevocably changing, and the artifacts of those cultures becoming scarce" followed by a quote form 1904 warning that objects from New Britain were becoming rare and expensive.
"Devoid of the purpose for which they were made, the masks were sold to European settlers and travelers. The rapidity which with the traditional were abandoned en masse means that the small number of known masks are unquestionably old."
"an example of a rich and untouched culture doomed to disappear upon contact with the western world. Under the impulse of German museums and Governor Hahl, most of the residents in the colony were engaged in an unrestrained search for ethnographic artefacts."
So the stories that the auction houses use to attract buyers is less "buy the grotesque" and more "buy the rarity and beauty that Europeans destroyed". The double think is staggering. They are inviting buyers to directly benefit from and enjoy the fruits of the destruction.
Here's another one: "This sculpture offers us a glimpse into the spiritual life of a primordial, autochthonous island culture, as it existed before the cataclysmic influence of Western contact." It goes on. It sold for $4,730,000.
Many essays in recent catalogues are written by academics. Are we as a discipline okay with writing marketing material? If the conclusion of the essay is "this piece is really important", why help push it away from a museum in the Pacific and in to the private market?
...no mention that the same auction house uncritically called these items "cannibal forks" in 100% of their prior sales. But, again, it is marketing material and I suppose by 2017 the market still wanted to BUY the primitivising cannibalism narrative, but not feel bad about it.
Also from 2017: "Like all Maori carvings once they are completed, hoe are considered to have a mauri, or a life force, and are thus seen and treated with the same respect as living beings." They're selling **living beings**, but using that to entice buyers.
I need to stop tweeting this and write this all up as a paper, but what really gets my goat about this the recent catalogues of Pacific items is their obsession with highlighting evidence for these things being "old", so pre/during European conquest and domination...
See in the Pacific (and elsewhere) local artists started producing artworks to sell to all of the thirsty Europeans who were rolling in to suck up whatever material culture they could from island communities. Why not at that point? The art was great AND it was made for sale.
Yes, that set up was a direct result of domination and control too, but those market pieces both brought in an income and were decidedly not, you know, the most sacred and important of cultural things. They are for the market. I don't see marketing that stuff as so problematic.
But the contemporary white American/European art market doesn't want that stuff. They want the "authentically" ancient, powerful, sacred (read "primitive" which they have stopped saying but still mean). The marketing wording works to establish this.
So you get the message of "No, seriously, this piece was totally stolen or taken under pressure or duress by a pro European collector. We promise it wasn't produced willingly and for the market by an Indigenous artist who had some degree of control over the transaction". Classy.
