April, 1994 - (edited)
Introduction
This exhibition is made possible by a generous
loan from the Steven C. Chiaramonte Collection of Western New Guinea Art,
Artifacts and Body Adornments. Mr. Chiaramonte undertook expeditions into the
Asmat region of Irian Jaya during the spring of 1992 and again in the autumn of
1993 for the purposes of building his collection of tribal art and to study and
learn from the indigenous peoples of this region. Previously a corporate
executive and business advisor, Mr. Chiaramonte maintains long-term interests
in environmental advocacy and the values of ethnic traditions. Mr. Chiaramonte
has been long fascinated by the Asmat. These are a people whose geography,
culture and tradition are among the most remote in the world. Leaving behind
the comfort of Salt Lake City, an arduous journey took Mr. Chiaramonte to
several of the villages visited by Michael Rockefeller in the early 1960s. Few
others had visited this region since Rockefeller's disappearance amidst
suspicious circumstances and allegations of his demise amongst
cannibal-headhunters. Mr. Chiaramonte found a thriving culture of
hunter-gathers largely isolated from the curiosity and technology of western
civilization. Opened to casual visitation from the West for only one year at
that time, Mr. Chiaramonte found in Asmat a people living in a splendid natural
environment. However, he returned to the United States with tremendous concern
for the Asmat, doubting that the people of the region could resist change, as
they had for decades, for even a few years longer. His second visit to Asmat,
which followed a river journey into the restricted and very primitive areas
inhabited by Korowai and Kombai tribal peoples, proved out his concern, as a
comparative flood of Western influences seemed to be driving Asmat culture.
Most of Mr. Chiaramonte's collection was developed during his initial visit, at which time he found a strong adherence to traditional art forms, materials and techniques. In 1993 he found souvenir art to be plentiful and traditional objects much more difficult to locate. Not yet on the circuit for adventure travelers, Mr. Chiaramonte became fearful of the fact that Asmat will soon be opened broadly to all who wish to visit. Evidence of spoilage may unfortunately be observed throughout New Guinea, particularly in areas where travel and economic inroads are made more easily than in the difficult swamps of Asmat.
Mr. Chiaramonte plans to return to Asmat, perhaps to push further into the most primitive areas, where travel was previously forbidden. When local governments are unable to assure safe passage, or otherwise fear the prying eyes of outsiders, rivers are simply closed off to traffic - some have never been opened. As the waves of the West press inland like the rising equatorial tides, it is known that even today there are people in the jungles of Irian Jaya who have yet to be contacted.
Spiritual Balance - Asmat Art in Context
In a densely forested alluvial swamp of some 100 by 150 kilometers in dimension, the Asmat eke out an existence along the countless rivers by hunting, fishing and gathering their staple food, the sago palm. In this equatorial region where tidal influences reaching as high as five meters are observed up to eighty kilometers from the coast, and where the steaming mud left exposed by an outgoing tide makes transportation nearly impossible, the Asmat live in numerous villages at rivers' edge. Their villages are comprised of small houses rising on stilts above the incoming tides with at least one communal long house, or jeu, serving as the bachelor's home and as the cultural and political center for village life. A typical village may be occupied by several hundred individuals, but a few claim as many as two thousand.
The Asmat are a Melanesian, dark skinned people, numbering near 70,000, inhabiting the southwest coast of the island of New Guinea at the far western edge of the pacific ocean. Asmat, meaning "tree-people" or "men-of-wood", refers also to their collective language and many dialects, as well as to the area that they inhabit. Living a pre-store age existence, it is thought that the Asmat have inhabited this area for perhaps less than four centuries. Studies of their art and culture lead some to believe the Asmat once migrated from the Sepik River area at the north coast of New Guinea. Their numbers have grown over the past four decades as Western medical technology has become available in the more accessible areas and as their once frequent and traditional headhunting raids have been discouraged by both Western missionaries and the sovereign Indonesian government.
The Asmat wood carvers, the wow-ipits, produce traditional wood-carvings which rank among the most dramatic and expressive of any people. The wow-ipits, taking up daily residence in the jeu, are among the most highly respected individuals in Asmat society, as it is they who allow the Asmat village to communicate, harmonize and seek balance with their spirit world (safan) through the art they create.
The Asmat live with the spirits of their dead. Maintaining a balance between safan and the world of the living is of indescribable importance to the Asmat. Such a balance is carefully maintained through a continuous cycle of periodic feasts, ceremonies and bloody warfare. The wow-ipits' carvings play an important role in the preparation and carrying out of each of these acts. Few, if any, of these rituals could be completed without the wow-ipits communicative craft and the presence of the Spirits which is made possible through their efforts.
Every carving and virtually every tool used by the Asmat are named for a deceased ancestor. Often a shield or other important item will embody the spirits and perhaps even bear a carved, stylized resemblance to other ancestors in addition to the one for which the item has been named. This naming or dedication is done so that the owner of an item will have a constant reminder of the need to avenge the death of his relatives. Known more as vicious headhunters who ritually consume the flesh of their enemies, the Asmat are lesser-known as deeply spiritual people whose violent acts are required by their deceased ancestors, in order to maintain balance in their fragile cosmos.
Life-Giving Drums and Their Role in the Asmat Creation Myth
The legend of Fumeripits describes a lone being brought to life in an archaic forest. Fumeripits built and lived in a giant feast-house. Having grown tired of his singular existence, Fumeripits felled several trees and from them he carved shapes in the form of men and women. He so enjoyed the companionship brought by these carvings that he carved a drum from the trees also. He covered the drum with the skin of a lizard and began to rhythmically beat upon it. To the beating of the drum, the wooden figures came to life and began to dance as the Asmat do today. These figures, now given life by Fumeripits' drumbeat, became the forebears of the Asmat.
The men of Asmat carve drums much the same as the one which Fumeripits is believed to have beat upon in the forest many years ago. A drum is made over a period of months by hollowing out a log, probably at or near the river's edge, then burning its interior into the distinctive hourglass shape with embers from the fire that smolders day and night within the jeu. A lizard skin is sized cut and sealed to the top of the drum with a mixture of the drum owner's blood, the blood of one or more of his wives mixed with lime retrieved from grinding the burned shells of a mollusk that inhabits the muddy river bed. Rattan or other fibers are used to permanently secure the skin to the drum and heat from the fire and added beads of beeswax are applied to the skin in order to tune the drum.
Drums are highly prized by the Asmat and may be kept for extensive periods of time, as a certain drum will inevitably become an owner's most prized. Drums are played often, perhaps every day, but certainly on occasions such as feasts, celebrations, and meetings. At these times, the legend of Fumeripits may be reenacted with men slowly rising to the drum beat from a position with elbows and knees touching to sway and shuffle as their ancestors once did when wooden limbs evolved to flesh and bone. Drums are always beat by the Asmat in the same slow monotonous rhythm as described in the legend of Fumeripits.
A Death Must Be Avenged - The Headhunting Ritual and Carving the Bis Pole
With the exception of the very old or very young, no one in Asmat is believed to pass to a natural death. Even those who do not succumb to the sharpened point of a warrior's blade are believed to have perished because of magical spells cast by an adversary from a neighboring village. The long infirm are thought to have weakened and eventually expired, because the enemy wished it so.
Upon the death of a member of the village, an elder may be called upon to make inquiry of the victim's body. The corpse, and the spirit that may still reside nearby, will be asked to provide important identifying information concerning, for instance: on which river does the enemy who caused this tragedy reside? Questioning continues: "Which village? Which jeu affiliation, within that village? In which house does the person live? Which person in the house caused the death? These bits of information are necessary in order for a raid to be organized, to take a life in return, thereby avenging the recent death and encouraging the spirit of the deceased to leave the village of the living and ascent to the ancestral world of safan.
Though the village of the deceased may seek to diligently establish the details regarding a recent death, the capture of any single inhabitant from the presumed offending village will satisfy the requirement for a victim. The death of a man, woman or child will appease the spirit of the deceased person and encourage that spirit to make a prompt exit from the world of the living. Unavenged spirits may be allowed to roam about the village, sometimes for years, but this is considered unwise and must eventually be corrected. These unavenged spirits are thought to cause chaos, ruining sago harvests, bringing about violent storms and inciting ill fortune, until proper retribution is provided and cosmic balance has been restored.
Once village elders have determined to avenge recent deaths, the village wow-ipits is called upon to create a bis pole or poles in the likeness of those ancestors whose deaths are to be avenged. The men of the village wear the customary warrior dress of lime-painted bodies adorned with feathers and sago accoutrements. Gathering spears and shields into the fleet of village war canoes, each upward of 12 meters in length, they hunt, track and kill and appropriate mangrove tree deep within the swamps. The tree is cut down, stripped of all but one of its large aerial buttress roots and most of its bark and foliage are removed, causing it to bleed a red, blood-like sap.
The freshly killed tree is returned to the village amongst great fanfare and sounding of the feu, or signal horn, acknowledging a successful hunt. As the men approach, the village women attack, discharging arrows, hurling spears and brandishing clubs. The men accept this aggression from their women, as it is thought necessary to drive any residual evil spirit from the recently killed tree.
The women, meanwhile, take great joy in becoming the aggressor in a society which otherwise demands their subservience. The tree is brought to the wow-ipits who then hides it within a secret room at the rear of the jeu. Over a period of weeks, the tree is transformed into an intimidating and expressive likeness of the village ancestors - the bis pole. This is a period of constant preparation for the entire village. Large sago grubs, the larvae of the Capricorn beetle, which, when collected within a palm sheath resemble a squirming brain, are grown and harvested for consumption prior to the headhunting raid. This raid will culminate in the bis ceremony. Nightly celebration and orgiastic sexual rituals, at times lasting though the entire period of darkness may occur frequently as the poles near completion. The entire village becomes frenetic and when the bis poles are brought for display on a scaffold in front of the jeu, the raid on an offending village is eminent.
A large war party, leaving the village by canoe in the early morning hours approaches the sleeping inhabitants of the offending village. Reaching landfall they infiltrate the village and sound the feu. In confusion and fear, the victims of the raid race out of their homes and attempt to seek sanctuary in the surrounding jungle. One, perhaps more, does not realize that refuge.
Captured, perhaps stabbed by a spear, the victim is bent over at the waist and tied to a cross-piece in the war canoe, soon to be finished off with a dagger. During the return journey, the war party assembles their canoes where malevolent spirits dwell, at the whirlpool created where rivers converge. Here, with a bamboo knife, the head of the victim is severed before the party continues home.
The victim's name is announced proudly by his captor. His head is displayed to a cheering crowd of women and children. The victim's blood anoints the bis pole and the spirits of the deceased, until then contained within, are set free to make their journey to the nether world. A day later, the skull is punctured at the temple with a ceremonial stone axe. The brain is removed to be consumed by either the captor or another important member of the village, perhaps one who is ailing or otherwise in particular need of the strength provided by this spiritually important foodstuff. The body is butchered according to ritual and the victim is cooked with sago and consumed by all village members at a feast. Traditionally the bis will be returned to the forest where the soft wood quickly decomposes and provides sustenance to the stands of sago.
The representative bis pole in figure three (see photos available in hard-copy of monograph) was donated to the Museum by Steven Chiaramonte in 1993. Originating from the coastal region of Central Asmat in the 1980's and collected in 1992, this example is smaller than many in size, yet embodies the likenesses of four ancestors. Bis poles may reach a height of six meters and embody the spirits of four or more ancestors. Painted with white lime, the Asmat color of the dead, they exhibit scarification designs of the deceased and outlines of bones, which are painted with ocher mud, traded to the Asmat from nomadic tribal people upstream near the Jayawijaya Mountains. They are often adorned with sago fiber decorations, feathers and seeds. The third color known to Asmat artists, black from the charcoal of the fire is used on the bis pole to represent hair and other features. The large pennant shaped tjsemen, or penis, at the top of the pole emanates from the single buttress root preserved in downing the mangrove tree. It is through this tjsemen that the collective spirits embodied within the pole are released into safan.
Bone Daggers - The Raiding Headhunters Primary Killing Tool
While stories are known of warriors who venture into battle with only a shield, the sight of which will frighten an enemy into surrender, it is the dagger that is the primary tool of death. Bone daggers may be made from a human femur or the similar leg-bone of a cassowary. The Cassowary is a quite large, dangerous and plentiful bird which is indigenous to New Guinea and is related to the ostrich and emu. Sharpened to a point and sometimes elaborately carved with barbs and decorations, a cassowary's claw may be attached with tree sap or beeswax to create a replaceable and very sharp tip - and a nasty infection for the somewhat lucky soul who may escape only wounded. Further decoration is provided, by the weaving of a sago fiber sheath over the knuckle and attaching silver-grey coix seeds from the Job's tear grass and red abrus seeds from the crabs-eye vine. Final embellishment is provided, by attaching feathers of the cockatoo or more often, the cassowary. A very rare dagger might be made from the lower jaw of a crocodile and decorated similarly. Such a dagger would be considered a most prized possession of the Asmat warrior.
Cassowary derived products and motifs in wood-carvings are very common in Asmat art and artifacts, as are products and motifs including the fruit bat or flying fox, the cuscus or possum, the cockatoo, especially the black king cockatoo, and the hornbill. The Asmat admire and revere these animals, each plentiful in the forest, because they are also headhunters. Since the Asmat were born of the wood from a tree, they observe no distinction between man and tree, analogous are a man's legs to a tree's roots, and his arms to the limbs. Since these animals feed on fruit, the head of the tree, the Asmat feels akin to them. Decorations derived from thought headhunting species other than man are believed to increase the spiritual power of the warrior and to assist in frightening the enemy.
The Asmat Today - An Art and Culture in Transition
Collections of Asmat art are generally classified into three periods: the early 1900s up to the first world war; the period following the second world war and concluding with the disappearance of Michael Rockefeller; and the period of Indonesian rule, from the early 1960s to the present. The items in this exhibition are from the later period. During the initial period noteworthy collections were assembled in Europe, by the Dutch. Today, the most important collections from this period reside in Lieden and at the National Museum in Jakarta. The second period saw vast collections gathered again by the Dutch and Germans, but also by Americans. The Rockefeller collection from late in this period is today displayed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. The modern period is dominated by collections in Germany, notably the Ursula and Gunter Konrad collection in Monchengladbach and that of the Asmat Museum of Culture and Progress in Agats, Irian Jaya. Several significant collections of Asmat art are maintained in the United States; most notably by the American Museum of Asmat Art in Shoreview, Minnesota, the Peabody Museum in Salem, Massachusetts and by the Asmat Crosier Museum in Hastings, Nebraska.
There are notable gaps in the collections from these periods. Virtually no collections were assembled during the period between the two great wars and shortly following the disappearance of Michael Rockefeller in 1961. As a result of the various assertions that he had fallen to cannibalistic ritual while collecting for the Museum of Primitive Art, Asmat borders were all but sealed after the Rockefeller incident. For most of thirty years until 1991, outsiders other than certain missionary and government personnel were forbidden entry to Asmat. During this period the area passed from the benign neglect of Dutch rule, through a period of stewardship by the United Nations, to be eventually ceded to Indonesia. Renamed Irian Jaya (Victorious Irian), the former Irian Barat (West Irian) was now set upon an unavoidable course of rapid change.
Following a period of government suppression of native custom that halted the activities of the wow-ipits, a resurgence of carving began in the 1970s with the encouragement and assistance of the Crosier Catholic Mission. It was not, however, until 1991 that unofficial visitors were allowed entry to the area, and then only within strict guidelines and with proper permits and safeguards to ensure their safe return to the outside world.
Today the Asmat are rapidly acculturating within the modern century. Headhunting has effectively been stopped in the frequently contacted areas and ipits now carve regularly for annual competitions sponsored by the Crosier Catholic Mission. This, however, is in addition to continued carving for the traditional spiritual and communicative purposes. The Mission has encouraged the Asmat to continue to create his art. Unlike the stereotypical missionary church that we may expect, the Asmat chapel may be filled not with the recognizable icons of Catholicism, but with the traditional spiritual carving the wow-ipits, depicting their most revered ancestors and headhunting cousins from the forest.
The Asmat departed from a pre-stone age existence to observe modern technology served up before them within a single generation. Wow-ipits were provided rough-sawn planks by mission personnel, upon which they would invent a new form of their craft called ajour. Those outsiders exploring the region in the 1960s found that soft swamp-forest woods did not travel easily, so they commissioned carvings in the native ironwood, allowing much more intricate carving to evolve. Interestingly, modern chisels sometimes offered have often been rebuked by the Asmat in favor of the traditional bone, shell, tooth and occasion flotsam rusty nail which make up the wow-ipits tool kit.
With collectors increasingly recognizing the talents of the Asmat and with the added profound forces of economics, one can today collect canoe prows that were never attached to war canoes. Similarly, objects appear regularly depicting dramatic action figures carrying a spear or taking some other form for which no spiritual meaning has ever been described. These and other innovations by the Asmat are often encouraged by those who visit with them. These changes are not necessarily detrimental, as we expect art to evolve. Concerning, however, is how quickly and how effectively Asmat will evolve as a culture, and whether their culture will endure into the next century.
Many recent visitors to Asmat are considerably less than optimistic, but still, we hold hope in the spirit of the ancestors that the Asmat may find balance in their new and changing world.
Steven C. Chiaramonte
April 1994 (Edited 1999)