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MUSEUM Spotlight 78 FIG. 5 (above): Bag, dilly. Western Arnhem Land, Northern Territory, Australia. Early 20th century. Fiber, pandanus leaf, ocher, feathers. H: 44 cm. Donated by Maurice Bastian in 1955; collected by Walter Baldwin Spencer in 1912. MEG Inv. ETHOC 025201. FIG. 6: Vessel for pukpuk. Batak, Sumatra, Indonesia. 19th century. Wood, celadon, copper, vegetal fiber, human remains. H: 32.5 cm. Acquired from Berkeley Galleries, London, in 1957; from the ethnography collection of William Ohly (1883–1955). MEG Inv. ETHAS 026784. century, in situ research was particularly favored because it allowed the museum to enlarge its collection. In the first half of the twentieth century, Pittard and Romanian ethnomusicologist Constantin Brailoiu actively pursued their studies. Other professional ethnologists, such as Hans Himmelheber (1908–2003), also collected for the museum (ETHAF 015847). Marguerite Lobsiger-Dellenbach, the museum’s second director, who served until 1967, solicited Horace van Berchem (1904–1982) to put together a vast ceramics collection that today has an important place in the MEG’s holdings. Exchanges with international institutions such as the Smithsonian Institution (fig. 14) and the Australian Museum in Sydney (ETHOC 028252 and ETHOC 028210) proliferated. Interpretation and comparison became paramount preoccupations, an approach that represented a reorientation of ethnography toward ethnology and ultimately toward anthropology. Lobsiger Dellenbach was a lively and colorful person, remarkably original for her time in Geneva, not only for having devoted herself to ethnography, but also for being a public figure in her position as a museum director. She set the tone by doing her first in situ collecting work in Nepal as a member of the Genevan scientific team on the Swiss expedition to Mount Everest from March through June of 1952. Alongside objects that represented the fruits of scientific activity, other important ones came to the MEG through diplomatic channels. Pittard took every available opportunity to encourage the many diplomatic representatives of his acquaintance at the League of Nations to supply the museum with representative objects from their countries. His efforts were especially fruitful with the Balkan nations, in which he had a particular interest since he had traveled extensively there. The history of the MEG’s collection as it is expressed in the introductory section of the museum’s new space is one that reaches exceptionally far back in time and gives an extensive and complete account of the evolution of Western perceptions of “others.” We felt it important that this historical story be told in some detail to the museum’s visitors, prior to presenting the main aspects of the museum’s collection, the presentation of which is organized geographically by continent, save for a general ethnomusicological display. A JOURNEY THROUGH HUMAN DIVERSITY In the geographic sections of the new MEG installation, there is no contextual scenery, no dioramas or displays of photographs, nor any other kind of didactic accessory. The galleries contain only groups and sub-groups of objects that themselves tell the story of the centuries-long classification of material testimonials to human creativity. No matter which of the continents is used as a starting point, throughout the installation the objects are individually placed into their temporal contexts based on their period of creation and use as well as on the time they were acquired. This is done to avoid any contradiction that might arise in the objects’ relationships to one another. The collection is presented more as a historical document than as an ethnographic accumulation. It constitutes a corpus that reflects the diversity of forms of social organization as well as an archive that expresses the infinite creativity of human societies. While some of the objects, such as the Buddhist works or the Polynesian tapas, are still used, most relate to religious or political rituals and practices that are now a part of the past. These serve as reminders not to give in to the anachronistic notion that anyone, in any society, ever thinks and acts in exactly the same way as his ancestors did at any given time in the past. Throughout the collection—an overview of which follows— we have sought to identify the artists, the objects’ creators, as well as their owners, whenever archival research has provided us with definitive information about their identity. Likewise, in the process of analyzing the MEG’s collection, special attention has been paid to shedding light on the contexts of the acquisition of pieces and on their provenances, as well as on any other details that could be useful in accurately placing an object in the time and space it existed in prior to its entry into the museum. The Asian department covers an immense cultural area, from the Bosphorus to Kamchatka and down to Borneo. With more than 15,000 objects, it is one of the MEG’s richest subcollections. This first exhibition area opens with a fifth- or sixth-century BC bronze Chinese bowl (ETHAS 033635), of which only one other example is known in China, and with a display of antique Western maps of Asia. Further along, as one moves eastward through the continent, three major themes— religious iconography, writing, and power—are developed. Each of these subjects is examined through groups of remarkable works, some of which are among the very finest in the museum. One of these, offered as an illustration of Chinese Buddhist iconography, is a thirteenth-century sculpture of Guanyin Pusa, the Bodhisatva of compassion (ETHAS 033646). The highlight of the section devoted to power relationships is undoubtedly the Japanese armor effigy of Fudo Myoo (ETHAS 022384), the domed helmet of which is signed “Yoshinori,” a Myochin artisan who was active in the second quarter of the fifteenth century. The armor’s cuirass is from the Genroku period (late seventeenth century) and shows a powerful protection scene in Tantric Buddhism—that of the Triad of the Indestructible King of Wisdom (Fudo Myoo Sanzon) with the youths Kongara and Seitaka. The Asian section then continues with Insulindia (Southeast Asia), a cultural region made up of some 17,000 islands,


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