The Pacific Islands, Africa, and the Americas

This volume presents the art of three large areas of the world where vital cultural traditions have flourished for centuries separate from the artistic traditions of the West. The art of these areas is thus highly individual, formed by dynamic, aboriginal societies and informed by their own valued heritage and traditions. Included in this volume is a broad selection of the arts of these areas now housed in The Metropolitan Museum of Art ́s Michael C. Rockefeller Wing. From the Pacific appear the extraordinary memorial poles made by the Asmat peoples of Irian Jaya in western New Guinea, and the commanding works of the Sepik region of Papua, New Guinea. Other objects range from a New Ireland funerary carving to a Maori feather box from New Zealand, and important male figures from the Gambier and Easter islands in Polynesia. The African sculptures come from the forest and savanna areas south of the Sahara Desert. A compelling thirteenth-century terracotta figure from the ancient city of Jenne is the earliest African work in the collection. Numerous royal sculptures in bronze and ivory document the five-hundred-year history of art in the southern Nigerian kingdom of Benin. Wood figures and masks illustrate the diversity of styles in African art. Precolumbian America is represented by works spanning a period of about 2,500 years. The earliest objects here are ceramic and jade sculpture of the Olmec peoples of Mexico. A rich selection of Precolumbian gold objects from Central America, Colombia, and Peru document this strong area of the Museum ́s holdings. -- Metropolitan Museum of Art website.