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Statue Of A'a From Rurutu
The Statue of A'a from Rurutu is a wooden sculpture of the god A'a that was made on the Pacific island of Rurutu in the Austral archipelago. In the early nineteenth century, the sculpture was given by the islanders to the London Missionary Society to mark their conversion to Christianity. Following this, it was brought back to England to be displayed, first in the museum of the LMS and then in the British Museum. The figure of A'a is famous as one of the finest surviving pieces of Polynesian sculpture, and in the twenty-first century the sculpture is, according to Julie Adams, curator of the Oceania collection at the British Museum "an international celebrity". Description The statue of A'a is a wooden anthropomorphic figure, 117 cm high and 36 cm wide. It is, in the estimation of Alfred Gell, "arguably the finest extant piece of Polynesian sculpture". The figure is hollow, and has a removable back panel allowing access to the interior. The sculpture's arms are carved ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
British Museum
The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It documents the story of human culture from its beginnings to the present.Among the national museums in London, sculpture and decorative and applied art are in the Victoria and Albert Museum; the British Museum houses earlier art, non-Western art, prints and drawings. The National Gallery holds the national collection of Western European art to about 1900, while art of the 20th century on is at Tate Modern. Tate Britain holds British Art from 1500 onwards. Books, manuscripts and many works on paper are in the British Library. There are significant overlaps between the coverage of the various collections. The British Museum was the first public national museum to cover all fields of knowledge. The museum was established in 1753, largely b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Deity Figure From Rarotonga
The Deity Figure from Rarotonga is an important wooden sculpture of a male god that was made on the Pacific island of Rarotonga in the Cook Islands. The cult image was given to English missionaries in the early nineteenth century as the local population converted to Christianity. It was eventually bought by the British Museum in 1911. Provenance The wooden figure was made on the island of Rarotonga in the late eighteenth century or early nineteenth century. After Captain James Cook's first sighting of the archipelago in 1773, Europeans began to visit the Cook Islands in the early nineteenth century as part of the colonisation of territories in the Pacific. This went hand-in-hand with mass conversion of the population to Christianity. At that time British missionaries were very active in the area and this idol was probably given up to the London Missionary Society after 1827, when they set up a mission on Rarotonga. The LMS initially loaned their important collection of Polynesian ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
17th-century Sculptures
The 17th century lasted from January 1, 1601 ( MDCI), to December 31, 1700 ( MDCC). It falls into the early modern period of Europe and in that continent (whose impact on the world was increasing) was characterized by the Baroque cultural movement, the latter part of the Spanish Golden Age, the Dutch Golden Age, the French ''Grand Siècle'' dominated by Louis XIV, the Scientific Revolution, the world's first public company and megacorporation known as the Dutch East India Company, and according to some historians, the General Crisis. From the mid-17th century, European politics were increasingly dominated by the Kingdom of France of Louis XIV, where royal power was solidified domestically in the civil war of the Fronde. The semi-feudal territorial French nobility was weakened and subjugated to the power of an absolute monarchy through the reinvention of the Palace of Versailles from a hunting lodge to a gilded prison, in which a greatly expanded royal court could be more easily k ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1590s Sculptures
Year 159 (CLIX) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time in Roman territories, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Quintillus and Priscus (or, less frequently, year 912 '' Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 159 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years. Events By place India * In India, the reign of Shivashri Satakarni, as King Satavahana of Andhra, begins. Births * December 30 – Lady Bian, wife of Cao Cao (d. 230) * Annia Aurelia Fadilla, daughter of Marcus Aurelius * Gordian I, Roman emperor (d. 238) * Lu Zhi, Chinese general (d. 192) Deaths * Liang Ji, Chinese general and regent A regent (from Latin : ruling, governing) is a person appointed to govern a state '' pro tempore'' (Latin: 'for the time being') because the monarch is a minor, absent, incapacitated or ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mangareva Statue
The Mangareva Statue or Deity Figure from Mangareva is a wooden sculpture of a male god that was made on the Pacific island of Mangareva in French Polynesia. The cult image was given to English missionaries in the early nineteenth century as the local population converted to Christianity. It was eventually bought by the British Museum in 1911. Provenance The wooden figure was made on the island of Mangareva in the late eighteenth century or early nineteenth century. The first Europeans to land on the island were from HMS Blossom under Captain Beechey in 1824. Soon afterwards, French missionaries converted the local population to Christianity. In 1835, Father Honoré Laval and Father François d'Assise Caret, with support of the reigning King Maputeoa and the former high priest Matua, destroyed most of what remained of the indigenous artwork, although Caret sent a few pieces to Europe. At that time, British missionaries were also active in the area and this idol was probably ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hoa Hakananai'a
Hoa Hakananai'a is a moai, a statue from Easter Island. It was taken from Orongo, Easter Island (Rapa Nui) in 1868 by the crew of a British ship and is now in the British Museum in London. It has been described as a "masterpiece" and among the finest examples of Easter Island sculpture. Though relatively small, it is considered to be typical of the island's statue form, but distinguished by carvings added to the back, associated with the island's birdman cult. Etymology The statue was identified as Hoa Hakananai'a by islanders at the time it was removed; the British crew first recorded the name in the form 'Hoa-haka-nana-ia' or 'Hoa-haka-nama-ia'. It has been variously translated from the Rapa Nui language to mean 'breaking wave', 'surfriding', 'surfing fellow', 'master wave-breaker', 'lost or stolen friend', 'stolen friend', 'hidden friend' or 'doing robberies/mockeries friend'. Provenance In 1868, Hoa Hakananai'a was standing erect, part buried inside a freestone c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Henry Moore
Henry Spencer Moore (30 July 1898 – 31 August 1986) was an English artist. He is best known for his semi-abstract art, abstract monumental bronze sculptures which are located around the world as public works of art. As well as sculpture, Moore produced many drawings, including a series depicting Londoners sheltering from the Blitz during the Second World War, along with other graphic works on paper. His forms are usually abstractions of the human figure, typically depicting mother-and-child or reclining figures. Moore's works are usually suggestive of the female body, apart from a phase in the 1950s when he sculpted family groups. His forms are generally pierced or contain hollow spaces. Many interpreters liken the undulating form of his reclining figures to the landscape and hills of his Yorkshire birthplace. Moore became well known through his carved marble and larger-scale abstract cast bronze sculptures, and was instrumental in introducing a particular form of modernism ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th century, he is known for co-founding the Cubist movement, the invention of Assemblage (art), constructed sculpture, the co-invention of collage, and for the wide variety of styles that he helped develop and explore. Among his most famous works are the Proto-Cubism, proto-Cubist ''Les Demoiselles d'Avignon'' (1907), and the anti-war painting ''Guernica (Picasso), Guernica'' (1937), Guernica (Picasso)#Composition, a dramatic portrayal of the bombing of Guernica by German and Italian air forces during the Spanish Civil War. Picasso demonstrated extraordinary artistic talent in his early years, painting in a naturalistic manner through his childhood and adolescence. During the first decade of the 20th century, his style changed as he experimente ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Roland Penrose
Sir Roland Algernon Penrose (14 October 1900 – 23 April 1984) was an English artist, historian and poet. He was a major promoter and collector of modern art and an associate of the surrealists in the United Kingdom. During the Second World War he put his artistic skills to practical use as a teacher of camouflage. Penrose married the poet Valentine Boué and then the photographer Lee Miller. Biography Early life Penrose was the son of James Doyle Penrose (1862–1932), a successful portrait painter, and Elizabeth Josephine Peckover, the daughter of Baron Peckover, a wealthy Quaker banker. He was the third of four brothers; his older brother was the medical geneticist Lionel Penrose. Roland grew up in a strict Quaker family in Watford and attended the Downs School, Colwall, Herefordshire, and then Leighton Park School, Reading, Berkshire. In August 1918, as a conscientious objector, he joined the Friends' Ambulance Unit, serving from September 1918 with the Briti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Avatea
In Cook Islands mythology, Avatea (also known as Vatea; meaning 'noon' or 'light') was a lunar deity and the father of gods and men in Mangaian myth of origin. His eyes were thought to be the Sun and the Moon; he was also known as the god of light. Mythology According to one myth, Vari-Ma-Te-Takere (The primordial mother) created six children from her body. Three were plucked from her right side and three from her left. The first of which was Avatea, the first man, who was perceived as a moon god. As he grew he divided vertically into a hybrid being; the right half was a man and the left half a fish. In song, the gods are called "children of Vatea". The same shortened phrase is in use at Rarotonga: at Aitutaki and Atiu the full form "Avatea" is used, e.g. ''kia kakā te mata o Avatea Nui'' meaning "when the eye of Great Avatea is open;" in other words "when the sun is in its full glory;" still in contrast with the darkness and gloom of Avaiki, or the Underworld. In Mangaian ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ta'aroa
Ta'aroa is the supreme creator god in the mythology of the Society Islands of French Polynesia. While the use of the ʻeta is appropriate given the pronunciation of his name, as is typically the case with Tahitian words it is often omitted in practice. He then created the queen of all nations. The Myth In the beginning, there was only Ta'aroa, creator of all, including himself. He waited alone in his shell, which appeared as an egg spinning in the empty endless void of the time before the sky, before the earth, before the moon, before the sun, before the stars. He was bored, alone in his shell, and so he cracked it with a shake of his body and slid out of its confines, finding everything somber and silent outside, finding himself alone in the nothingness. So he broke the shell into pieces and from them formed the rocks and the sand, and the foundation of all the world, Tumu-Nui. With his backbone he created the mountains; with his tears he filled the oceans, the lakes, the r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Ellis (missionary)
William Ellis (29 August 17949 June 1872) was a British missionary and author. He travelled through the Society Islands, Hawaiian Islands, and Madagascar, and wrote several books describing his experiences. Early life He was born in Charles Street, Longacre, London of working-class parents on 29 August 1794. His father (from Norwich) and a short-lived older brother (25 May 17933 December 1793) were also named William. (If a child died young, parents often named another child by the same name, especially if they wanted to pass on a parent's or grandparent's name.) Not much is known of his mother, whose maiden name was Sarah Bedborough (1772–1837). She was born in Reading, England, and her parents Daniel and Mary Bedborough had her baptised on 5 April 1772 in Hurst, Berkshire. She married William Ellis on 13 August 1792, and she died in Wisbech on 15 February 1837 aged 65. Their other children were: Sarah Ellis (born 9 December 1797 in St. Giles, London), Mary Ellis (born 6 Jan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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