Art Of The Day Weekly

#365 - from 20 November 2014 to 26 November 2014


Figurehead, 19th c., wood, mother-parl, 20 x 8,7 x 12,2 cm. © Musée du quai Branly, photo Claude Germain.

The Salomon Islands, so far

PARIS – When a Spanish navigator from the 16th century, Alvaro de Mendaña, was dazzled by the reflection of huge gold nuggets, he was convinced he had reached the kingdom of Salomon. They were only pyrite but this far-away archipelago in Oceania had found its definite name. Even though this group of islands has a certain importance in the French collective imagination since La Pérouse disappeared there in 1785, the land with eighty languages is badly known. How does the spirit of the elders, the ancestors, the vehicle of power or the “mana”, embody the ritual objects such as reliquaries or breastplates? How is a currency exchanged (complex objects in feathers and tortoise shell)? How important is the sea that gives birth to canoes and finely sculpted figures on the bow of boats? A few international loans and above all, the museum’s rich collection (a donation from Roland Bonaparte, the objects from the famous Korrigane expedition in 1934-36, etc.) allow the museum to answer these questions.
L’éclat des ombres, l’art en noir et blanc des îles Salomon at the musée du quai Branly, from 18 November 2014 to 1 February 2015.

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