Title

Canoe Shield

Description

This object was used during ceremonies related to war or fertility and the term used to describe the object is an ambiguous term. This object did not physically protect the occupants of the canoe, but the object endowed them with the power of the ancestor represented, and when the object was not used the object would have been affixed to a ceremonial house beside paddles.

Semester

Spring 2026

Subject

Indigenous Art

Morton D. May

Melanesian

Papua New Guinea

East Sepik Province

Temporal Coverage

mid-20th century

Spatial Coverage

East Sepik Province, Papua New Guinea

Language

Item description is in English

Medium

The object is made out of wood, pigment, and plant fiber

Source

Saint Louis Art Museum

https://www.slam.org/collection/objects/8334/

Is Part Of

Arts of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas

Morton D. May

Identifier

21:1977

Provenance

1971
Stendahl Galleries, Hollywood, CA, USA

1971
Harry A. Franklin Gallery, Beverly Hills, CA

1971 - 1977
Morton D. May (1914-1983), St. Louis, MO, purchased from Harry A. Franklin Gallery

1977
Saint Louis Art Museum, given by Morton D. May

Explanation of Omeka Map Location

This item originated in the East Sepik Province in Papua New Guinea