European Society for Oceanists 2022 Conference

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Session Detail (parallel)

Collections in motion: material things and immaterial understandings

Coordinator(s)

Fanny Wonu Veys, Karen Jacobs

Session presentation

Museums that hold Oceanic collections are not just physical sites for storage and preservation, but also spaces where things and people are in motion. Oceanic collections are loaned, exhibited, researched, exchanged, de-acessioned, re-used by descendants of Indigenous owners, repatriated or restituted. These same Oceanic collections are also at the centre of new or renewed relationships between museum audiences, Indigenous people, researchers, stakeholders, museum staff, artists and activists. Objects are the subject of reassessments, intergenerational knowledge exchange, reinterpretations and ongoing conversations leading to their associated immaterial knowledge being in constant motion as well.
In this panel we aim to focus on these motions and movements that make the appraisal of museum collections more layered and complex. The panel hopes to raise questions about the role of the museum in bringing the material and immaterial together, as well as its role in crossing geographical distance between Indigenous owners and local audiences, temporal barriers between past, present and possible futures and intergenerational boundaries.
We welcome papers that deal in particular with:
- Intergenerational knowledge exchange about objects
- Forms of knowledge sharing and collaboration between museums and Oceanic peoples
- Restitution, repatriation or long-term loans of objects
- Shifting exhibition practices and the role of different stakeholders
- Development by Pacific communities of grassroots documentation and musealisation projects
- Possible futures for Pacific collections

Paper submissions are closed

Accepted papers

Converting people, converting objects: ongoing itineraries of Dutch missionary collections from Papua to the Netherlands

Amélie Roussillon (Utrecht University)

This paper reflects on a current research project which investigates the itineraries and potentialities of objects acquired between 1855 and 1962 by Dutch Protestant and Catholic missionaries in Dutch New Guinea, which are now held in the National Museum of World Cultures in the Netherlands.
By focusing on objects acquired by the Protestant Utrecht Missionary Society and the Catholic Missionaries of the Sacred Heart, I propose to frame missionary collecting processes as a form of conversion, paralleling the transformation of acquired artefacts into missionary and eventually museum objects with the conversion of Papuans into Christians. The ongoing conversion of these artefacts into museum objects operates as a complex phenomenon of spatio-temporal and epistemological translation between the community of origin, the missionaries and the museum, but also today’s Papuan communities (in the Netherlands and in West Papua) and researchers, and along which meanings and values were lost but also created. I will highlight some of these processes (such as classification and display) which contributed to the conversion of Papuan things into missionary and museum objects.
By unravelling the multiple stations in these objects’ itineraries, I want to share some preliminary thoughts on how these collections can be reappraised in a multi-layered way and mobilised by different actors to address the Dutch colonial past and its afterlives in the Dutch society and beyond.

Moving between Museum Collections and Nations: Reconnecting Material Culture and Colonial History of Vanuatu

Laëtitia Lopes (University East Anglia)

As European nations face their colonial past and build new relationships with former colonies, museums and their collections that hold the traces of colonial encounters are at the centre of discussions. As museums connect past, present and future, it is more than ever essential to look at the histories embodied in their collections.
Due to the colonial relationships that entangled France and the United Kingdom with Vanuatu, large collections from the archipelago are preserved in French and British museums. These collections represent relationships of various kinds. Objects circulated and were extensively exchanged between Ni-Vanuatu people, Ni-Vanuatu and Europeans and between Europeans. This paper will focus on these collections and demonstrate how they can provide new perspectives on Vanuatu’s colonial history and the legacy of colonial relations with France and the United Kingdom.
Drawing on my ongoing PhD research, this paper will introduce and compare Vanuatu collections from museums in France and the United Kingdom. I will argue that a comparative approach can be a valuable tool to untangle the narratives embodied within collections and draw connections. Statistical data will be discussed, considering individuals' archives and publications from Europeans who visited the islands.

Commu-knitting collections in motion: the case of Daniel Palacz’s private collection

Mililani Ganivet (University of Hawaii at Manoa)

Mirose Paia (University of French Polynesia)

Daniel Palacz,a former diver of Polish descent on Moruroa, collected and acquired objects and archival materials in French Polynesia (FP) amounting to a private collection of more than 600 objects in addition to rare archival materials related to the history of FP. Although well-cited, his collection remained hidden in plain sight for a long time, accessed by a few and never indexed. Conceived as a museum space, the place where this private collection is held, could be perceived from the outside as a mere physical space for storing objects. Palacz recently opened his doors to students of the University of French Polynesia, foreseeing the potentiality of such collections to become teaching resources. What are the teaching values of private collections such as these? How can such initiatives broaden the potentiality of enlivening private collections in the landscapes of French Polynesia? How does the engagement of Indigenous students contribute to setting in motion new relationships between objects and people? This case-study paves the way to reflect upon broader issues relating to curation matters, the uses of Indigenous languages and the future of collections as key teaching resources.

Thinking through Wood

Hilke Thode-Arora (Museum Fuenf Kontinente)

Pacific collections in ethnographic museums include a large number of wooden artefacts. However, only in very few cases have in-depth analyses regarding their materiality or their deeper meanings been executed. Wood, wood carving and pieces made from wood can have metaphorical and metaphysical implications in Pacific cultures, and they may be interpreted as reflections of social order. Furthermore, historical artefacts now in museums played a part in a political economy of production and exchange, both on a local and a global scale, during colonial times.
In this case study, all wooden artefacts of the Maori collection in the Museum Fünf Kontinente will be scrutinized from different angles. To shed more light on the trajectories of circulation, a survey of the relevant literature will be combined with natural science approaches of assessing kinds of wood and carving techniques, ideally resulting in narrowing down locations and times of production. Provenance research will aim to trace back the artefacts to former owners and, if possible, the original Maori owners and makers. Collaboration with Maori specialists on wood, carving and carved pieces will be established to invite Maori expertise and reconnect the artefacts with their communities of origin.
Additional issues addressed here should be modern environmental concerns, loss or preservation of skills over generations, and the metaphorical and symbolic meanings of wood, carving, and certain wooden pieces in Maori culture

Measina in motion: Reanimating the Sāmoan collection at the Übersee-Museum Bremen in cooperation with the National University of Sāmoa

Stephanie Walda-Mandel (Übersee-Museum, Bremen)

Mitiana Arbon (Übersee-Museum, Bremen)

Many German museums are facing the urgent task of re-examining their collections stemming from colonial contexts and rethinking the way they deal with them. This paper explores the Übersee-Museum Bremen, as it re-examines, re-organizes, and re-connects its Oceanic (in particular Sāmoan) collections in partnership with cultural and scientific departments at the National University of Sāmoa. As part of the collaboration, the Museum has hired a Sāmoan curator and scientific intern to work on the new permanent and virtual exhibitions. The Museum is changing its interpretative approaches and curatorial decision making practices. Through workshops held with partners in Sāmoa, the development of topics and content planning is grounded in a Samoan perspective and visions of the Fa’a Sāmoa (Samoan customs). Additionally, with creative digital residencies with artists and scholars from the Pacific, the Museum is providing space in an effort to relinquish interpretative control. Working across disciplinary boundaries, this exhibition highlights novel insights into fluid configurations of cultural practices and environmental cosmologies based on the interplay of material collections.

Exhibiting the Rapa Nui collection at the National Museum of World Cultures

Fanny Wonu Veys (Museum van Nationaal Wereldculturen - National Museum of World Cultures)

Between 1882 and 1977, fifty-two Rapa Nui catalogue entries were made in the collection of the National Museum of World Cultures (NMVW) in the Netherlands. The link between Rapa Nui and the Netherlands goes back three hundred years when in 1722 the Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen spotted an island on his voyage without collecting any objects. The small NMVW Rapa Nui collection shows the extensive European museums’ networks. In addition, the collection testifies to the complex history of this isolated island. The fibre arts including baskets, fishnets, fish lines and barkcloth demonstrate the refined techniques and indigenous knowledge involved in thriving on an island of which the natural resources dwindled due to erosion, induced by introduced Polynesian rats and because of El Niño phenomena. Some of the carvings are materialisations of the upcoming tourism industry, something the population depended on largely after its population had decreased dramatically. The carvings also stand for the resilience of the indigenous Rapanui. The obsidian tools in the collection may refute the idea of constant infighting. For the 10th International Conference on Rapanui and the Pacific (Leiden, 19-24 June 2022), the NMVW is showcasing a large part of its Rapanui collections for the first time. This paper will explore how a museum display can possibly bridge the gap between popular ideas about Easter Island and letting Rapanui people tell their stories through the objects they made.

OFF THE MUSEUM WALL! An Examination of the Labelling on Kanak Collections in Various Museums

Carolina Gallarini (University of East Anglia)

Anthropology museums have the role of educating and representing different communities, and labels are therefore one of the most important means of communicating with the public. Room texts become the primary tool to meet didactic expectations and create satisfaction in visitors. However, as reported by numerous recent studies, museum labels often decontextualise the object from its community of origin, making it ahistorical and disconnected from its background. Not transcending old frameworks, these descriptive models do not reflect the movements and transformations of heritage. Moreover, the chosen language is frequently outdated and reproduce the archive cards, crystalised when the object arrived in the museum.
This study will be conducted with a comparative approach of various photos of Kanaky objects in museums and their respective labels, highlighting the differences between the written narratives, the quantity of data available to the museumgoers, and the different information chosen to express the relationship between the collections and Kanaky culture. Setting these labels as subjects, it will be possible to understand which levels of communication on Indigenous material heritage have been chosen, if the heterogeneous plurality and cultural movements of Oceanic societies have been reflected in the discourse of object’s biography, and if these texts have been re-evaluated according to the recent theories, emphasizing different voices in the museum rooms.

Contemporary Collaboration and Inspiration within the Museum

Jacqueline Charles-Rault (Université Le Havre Normandie)

Museums have been opening their doors to contemporary Indigenous artists for over a decade now to exhibit their work alongside their housed collections, the majority of which, would have been acquired through colonisation. Artists who have felt the need to reconciliate with de-animated objects exhibited either in museum displays or storage, have been given the opportunity to connect with their past, their ancestry and iwi, as well as highlighting the importance of their cultural belonging.
Contemporary Maori artist Fiona Pardington, of Ngāi Tahu ancestry, has been working closely with museum collections since 2001. It inspired her larger than life black and white photographs, hei tiki (2008) collection, and her series, Ahua: A beautiful hesitation (2010), comprised of photographs taken of life-casts of people from the Pacific in the nineteenth century, by the Frenchman Pierre-Marie Alexandre Dumoutier. This talk will look at the role of the artist within the museum and in particular Fiona Pardington, who over the past twenty years has worked within museums to create her artistic photographic imagery of objects. By working closely with museum collections new dialogues are created between the museum and the artist in how the collections are interpreted and in turn displayed. The role of the contemporary artist in the museum today can inevitably be argued as fundamental and indispensable in helping understand how cultures and traditions thrive and are maintained.

Seediq encounters and reconciliation at the National Museums of World Culture, Sweden

Aoife O'Brien (National Museums of World Culture)

In 2021, the National Museums of World Culture, Sweden (NMWC) began working with the Seediq, an Aboriginal group from Taiwan. Only grated official status since 2008, the Seediq have been working towards reengagement and relearning the specificities of their culture and language, principally through a university MA programme and multigenerational discussion and knowledge exchange. Working collaboratively, the NMWC, Seediq National Assembly, and Providence University are currently developing a digital and physical exhibition based on a previously unstudied early nineteenth century collection of Aboriginal Taiwanese objects held at the Museum of Ethnography, Stockholm. Experimental in its methodology, the exhibition emphasises co-creation and co-curation with Indigenous voices and perspectives given priority. In spring 2022, a research delegation spent two weeks in Stockholm seeking to identifying Seediq objects. Part of their work includes relearning the techniques their ancestors used to make objects and to attempt to recreate them today. For many, the objects encountered were new and the visit prompted a reconciliation with their ancestors, with the museum, and with Sweden. This paper documents this engagement. This project is part of the museums involvement in the Taking Care project, a co-funded Creative Europe Programme of the European Union, working specifically on the work programme ‘Designing Sustainable Futures’ with a focus on concepts of care and sustainability.

Mobile collections and mobilising youth - Urban Pathways: Fiji. Youth. Arts. Culture.

Karen Jacobs (University of East Anglia)

This paper will focus on case studies drawn from the collaborative research project Urban Pathways: Fiji. Youth. Arts. Culture, funded by the British Academy’s Youth Futures programme and supported under the UK Government’s Global Challenges Research Fund, in order to demonstrate how museum collections can be useful in mobilising new relationships that cross geographical and temporal boundaries. The aim of the project is to identify how urban Fijian youth experience culture and how cultural heritage institutions in Fiji can engage youth while offering viable employment opportunities. Our analysis is based on collaborations with urban Fijian youth in a range of arts and cultural heritage settings, including Fiji Museum and the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge. This paper will highlight the experiences of a group of young people who conducted internships, worked with museum collections and produced their own creations.

(Re)Connecting, (Re)Shaping, (Re)Telling: Youth Voices and the Future of Fiji Museum

Katrina Talei Igglesden (University of East Anglia)

The collaborative and British Academy-funded research project 'Urban Pathways: Fiji. Youth. Arts. Culture.' has brought together a group of 15 young people passionate about arts, heritage and the cultural & creative industries. This paper will focus on the 6 youth interns working at Fiji Museum and examine the process undertaken in planning their final project: a group exhibition. What do standard exhibition practices and the museum collections mean to this group of young people and, in turn, the different community stakeholders they represent? This will be compared with the concurrent exhibition planning taking place by veteran museum staff in the revamping of Fiji Museum's main gallery.

Re-membering Hawai‘i: Collaborative provenance research und restitution as (post)colonial relationship work

Philipp Schorch (LMU Munich)

Gesa Grimme (LMU Munich)

Noelle Kahanu

Material entities, classified as ‘ethnographic objects’ or ‘human remains’, and held in German museums bear witness to the political, economic and scientific entanglements between Hawai‘i and Germany emerging in the 19th century. This paper addresses the potential of (re)assembling and (re)activating these material and immaterial cultural connections – their re-membering – and argues for understanding the engagement with material presences and legacies through collaborative provenance research and restitution as future-orientated (post)colonial relationship work. The paper focuses on recent restitutions of iwi kūpuna from German collecting institutions to Hawai‘i, and the underlying relationships from the past to the present. It took bodies and biographies to collect and create knowledge, and it takes bodies and biographies to restitute and revise knowledge. Provenance research and processes of restitution point to the need for ethical museum practices that are attentive to sensitive concerns. Such ethical and sensitive considerations themselves generate, rather than restrict, new knowledge. They are brimming with epistemic and ontological potentialities: for the people related to the material entities concerned, for the knowledge generated with them, and for the institutions involved. Collections in motion always entail people in motion, and material things and immaterial understandings appear as two inseparable dimensions of the same processes of departure and return.