Figure

Item number C388 from the MOA: University of British Columbia.

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Description

Carving of a female head from the shoulders up. Black with tattoo marks on face and elongated ears with elaborate plugs, orange brown hair.

Narrative

Burnett wrote (about curio-collecting on New Georgia) that his most valuable finds were a black stone food masher ... [and] a woman's bust in ebony decorated with inlaid shell, the head being surmounted with real human hair." Also, that "As regards the woman's bust, there are only two old men left in the group who now do this kind of work, which is really most artistic; so that, without doubt, it will very shortly become a lost art. After several ineffectual attempts to obtain these two valuable articles, I enlisted Mr. Wheatley's services, with the result that I eventually secured them."