New Acquisitions

Thierry Gentis, Curator                                                                                                                                

One of the considerations in the decision to accept new donations is our continuing endeavor to provide a more complete contextualization of related materials with the goals to improve the educational, research and exhibition value of the collection.

An example of this is Cesare Decredico’s gift of a Kuba man’s prestige hat (Laket mishiing).  This hat is complemented by the gift of Anna Cooper Heath of a Kuba hatpin with bell (Ndwoong Angwoong).  This hatpin is traditionally used to secure the Laket mishiing hat on the individuals head.  In the highly stratified culture of the Kuba peoples, a variety of hats worn by men are used to display their social status.  This also extends to the ornaments that can be added to these hats.  Hat pins made of copper are more prestigious than ones made of brass or iron and the feathers of certain birds, like the harpy eagles, are restricted to the highest ranking chiefs.  

 

 

We have purchased a sculpture by renowned Oceti Sakowin (Lakota) and Puerto Rican artist, Tom Haukaas, which was very timely, given the pandemic. Tom’s piece, created in 2020 attests that we will need to make adaptations, but we and our institutions will survive. 

The sculpture is fitted with an anti-Covid-19 mask made of brain-tanned, smoked bison hide that is decorated with white seam binding, seed beads colored greasy blue and various colors of porcupine quills embroidered to the hide utilizing the historic two needle quill technique.  We wish to extend a special thanks to Barbara A. Hail who brought this piece to our attention and made this purchase possible. 

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Wounaan Baskets

Collections of contemporary arts Like the Wounaan and Embera baskets can provide an outlook to the Pre-Columbian past when we observe continuities in the representations of animals like the jaguar on archaeological artifacts and their depictions on the contemporary baskets made for sale by the Wounaan and Embara people of Panama.

In the 1980s Wounaan and Embera people in the Darien rainforest of Panama began to weave fine and intricately decorated baskets for outside markets.  This transformation from traditional utilitarian baskets that were rarely or sparsely decorated, to high art came as a direct response to the Wounaan and the Embera growing contact with a wider world.  With the rise of tourism to the region the production of beautiful baskets, as well as being a source of cultural pride, is also a means to earn money.  Allowing the Wounaan and Embera to function in a cash-based economy.  Evident in this art is the love that the Wounaan and Embera people have for the Darien forest and the animals that inhabit it.

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Gifts to the Collection

The collections of the Haffenreffer Museum continue to grow through of the generosity of our many donors. We wish to thank them for their support of our educational mission.  It is an honor to steward objects with such a rich and powerful history, and we are grateful to those who choose us as their collections’ next stop on their journey.

Gift of Michelle Hegmon

Walrus tusk cribbage board with engraving of flowers, whales, and map of the Alaskan Islands

Gift of William and Michelle Tracy

Three sets of Beaded Pow-wow leggings and moccasins.

Three Pow-wow outfits, Northern Plains.

Gift of John J. Toohey

Statuette of Isis and Horus, Egyptian, 26th Dynasty.

Gift of the Carole Anderson Bonnoitt Estate

Maasai necklace, Kenya

Gift of Rebecca W. S. More and Timothy T. More

Basket depicting monkeys in trees, Wounaan, Panama.

Gift of Charles and Patricia McLure

38 Wounaan and Embera baskets, from the Darien Rainforest of Panama.

Gift of Professor Edward B. Dwyer

10 examples of Shipibo/Conibo pottery from eastern Peru, collected in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

A Shipibo/Conibo geometric painted textile, Eastern Peru, 1960s.

Gift of Vincent and Margaret Fay

42 Pre-Columbian Taino artifacts consisting of ceramics vessels, stone pestles and stone, bone, and shell amulet carvings, Dominican Republic.

Gift of John R. Bockstoce

Eight Eskimo/Inuit tools from Unavut, Canadian Territory and Point Hope, Alaska.

Gift of Cesare Decredico

African items including a Kuba hat, five Akan gold weights and a Lobi pendant.

Gift of Anna Cooper Heath

31 African objects

Gift of Lina Fruzzetti and Akos Ostor

14 paintings by Patua (Chitrakara) women of Nay, West Bengal.

Yanomami basket (collected by David Maybury-Lewis and given to Lina Fruzzetti).

Two Yanomami boat paddles.

Gift of Kenneth Froberg

Pair of Oglala Lakota women’s leggings, Central Plains.

Full grooved hammerstone from Jamestown, Rhode Island.

 

Cover photography and object photography by Juan Arce