92 Chiefs & Governors Fijian Art at the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Cambridge Chiefs & Governors: Art and Power in Fiji, the first major UK exhibition dedicated to Fijian art, is presently on view at the University of Cambridge Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology (MAA). Inspired by MAA’s extraordinary Fijian collection, it introduces central features of Fijian culture and highlights key aspects of precolonial and early colonial history (Herle and Carreau 2013). Richly patterned barkcloth (masi), exquisite ornaments, and carvings in whale ivory and wood celebrate the ingenuity and expertise of their makers and demonstrate the dynamism of Fijian art and culture. The exhibition is an outcome of the collaborative Fijian Art Research Project (2011–2014) led by Professor Steven Hooper, director of the Sainsbury Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, in association with MAA (see details below). Supported by a grant from the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council, this project is providing the opportunity to systematically study more than 2,500 Fijian artifacts alongside photographs and archives in MAA’s collections and to develop comparative research on specific object types and collection histories in association with numerous UK and overseas partner institutions, including the Fiji Museum in Suva, Fiji. The core of MAA’s Fijian collection, including most of the rich material on display, was acquired by the official residents and guests of Governor Sir Arthur Gordon’s household shortly after Fiji’s cession to the British Crown in 1874. The circumstances of these objects’ acquisition reflect the complexity of historical relations between Fiji, Britain, and Cambridge. The bulk of the collection assembled at Government House was transferred to Cambridge, where they were used to help establish the Museum of General and Local Archaeology (now MAA) in 1884. Gordon and one of his private sec- By Anita Herle ART on view FIG. 1: Barkcloth, gatuvakaviti. Collected in Fiji. Section of barkcloth with the main panel decorated in the rubbed Tongan style and a Fijian-style stencilled masikesa border design. L: 245 cm. Photo: Jocelyne Dudding. © MAA Z 30433. retaries, Alfred Maudslay, were both Cambridge graduates, and Baron von Hügel, an avid collector and parttime resident of Government House, became the founding curator, a position he held for nearly forty years. Many of these precious objects reflect the movement of people, ideas, and skills within Western Polynesia and beyond. Some were used to mediate relationships and consolidate alliances between powerful chiefs in Western Polynesia and between Fijian chiefs, British governors, and others. Not surprisingly, many of the most outstanding Fijian objects in MAA’s collection were presented to Sir Arthur and Lady Gordon during the period of his governorship (1875–1880). There is a long history of exchange between groups in Fiji, Tonga, and Samoa. It is sometimes difficult to determine whether specific objects were traded into Fiji or made within Fiji by specialists from elsewhere. Some materials clearly demonstrate the intermingling of distinctive cultural traits. For example, a distinctive type of barkcloth combines the Tongan style of decoration produced by a rubbing technique with Fijian stencilled designs along one or more borders (fig. 1). Known as gatuvakaviti (Fijian barkcloth in the Tongan style), these likely developed in the 1700s as markers of new marriage alliances between Fijian and Tongan lineages (Clunie 1986:127). Rare ivory figurines, usually female, originating from Tonga or produced by Tongan artisans within Fiji, were venerated as ancestor gods and secluded in the shrines of some Fijian spirit houses (burekalou) (Clunie 2013). They were expertly carved from the teeth of sperm whales (Physeter catodon or macrocephalus), oiled, and smoked over a smoldering fire of sugary tubers to produce a rich reddish patina. Many appear to be of con
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