Our cover shows a “moon mask” from the Tlingit of the Sitka area of southern Alaska, 1830–50, collected by the Reverend Sheldon Jackson. Wood and red, black, blue pigment. H: 25.4 cm. Princeton University Art Museum, Department of Geology and Geophysical Sciences loan, Princeton University. inv. PU 3912. Photo: Bruce M. White. 2 Editorial I’m not alone in fi nding antique cartography absolutely fascinating. Unlike modern maps (hopefully, at least), these vintage renderings are made up of a unique and scintillating blend of fact, extrapolation, political agenda, and optimism, in the best cases seasoned with a soupçon of outright fantasy. There are any number of examples of this, from Hy Brasil, an entirely mythical island west of Ireland that was a regular feature on maps until the mid-nineteenth century, to the Kingdom of Prester John, located anywhere from China to Ethiopia, depending on the source. As a native of California, I’ve always been particularly fond of “Isla de Californie,” or the Island of California. True to its name, this was a misconception which held that California was a landmass unconnected to the rest of North America. Here, the western and southern coasts are vaguely accurately depicted, while the east is generally separated by the Mar Vermejo (Vermilion Sea) and the north is sometimes bordered by the Northwest Passage (probably the Strait of Juan de Fucca, just south of Vancouver) or simply falls off into the terra incognita of a blank spot on the map. The notion originally stems from a popular Spanish novel titled Las sergas de Esplandián by Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo, which was published in 1510, well before any European had ever laid eyes on the region. He wrote: “Know, that on the right hand of the Indies there is an island called California very close to the side of the Terrestrial Paradise; and it is peopled by black women, without any man among them, for they live in the manner of Amazons.” This made it sound pretty sexy, and the idea took root in the popular imagination, so when the fi rst Spaniards landed on the tip of Baja California in 1533, they assumed that they had found the fabled California. While the fi rst map to actually use the term California in print, that of Diego Gutiérrez from 1562, is noncommittal on the subject (the juncture of the eastern edge of what we now know as the Baja Peninsula with the greater landmass to the north falls just off the eastern edge of the designated area), many maps for well more than a century after clearly depicted an island. Although the expeditions of Francisco de Ulloa and Hernando de Alarcón in the northern Sea of Cortez around 1540 utterly debunked the island theory, it was still depicted, in part because it was so thoroughly rooted in the popular imagination, in part because of resulting misconceptions by cartographers, and, later, deliberately to counter Francis Drake’s 1579 claim of New Albion near San Francisco for the British Crown by intentionally designating the region an island from Vancouver south to Baja, where the Spanish had a fi rm political claim. This dizzying bit of cartographic history is weirdly analogous to popular conceptions relating to all too many of the cultures we have addressed between the covers of this magazine for more than two decades. The vast majority of the artwork we feature was collected by Europeans or Americans who had little time, inclination, or often ability to truly understand what they had in their hands. As such, cultural denominations can be vague and misleading, sometimes for political or social reasons that at the time were paramount, sometimes out of ignorance, and sometimes because the information that was once known was forgotten because it simply didn’t seem relevant. That such misinterpretation has deep roots in the West is evidenced by early works like Charles de Brosses’ Du culte des dieux fétiches, which draws parallels between sub-Saharan “fetishistic” practices and ancient Egyptian religion, an audacious comparison given that virtually nothing was known about either in Europe at the time. Despite the best efforts of later, more qualifi ed anthropologists, there is a great deal of work to be done to undo existing misinterpretations, and much of what today’s scholarship in our fi eld attempts to accomplish is to document what information remains and try to reconstruct that which was callously or carelessly lost. Take as just one example, Lobi statuary, which every African art collector in the world will instantly recognize. Yet many will be surprised by the fascinating information presented by Daniela Bognolo in her article in these pages, which clarifi es that not only is there no Lobi “style” per se (and barely a distinctive Lobi people relative to the vast art corpus attributed to them), but instead a “Lobi-esque” socioreligious movement among an array of neighboring cultures, in which an interlocking sculptural style embodied sacred concepts. Far from the typical gallery label reading “Ancestor Figure, Lobi, 19th–early 20th century,” each had a name, a purpose, and was created by a recognized artist. Similarly, Bettina von Lintig’s article in this issue takes an object found in a rural English auction and reconnects it with the context from which it derived as well as the notable fi rst contact between a European and the Bangwa people of Cameroon in the late nineteenth century. As if loss of context were not enough, all may not be as it seems—by nefarious intent. William Henry Skinner thought he was forming an important collection of Maori art in the early years of the twentieth century, but a distressing percentage of his objects were actually contemporary creations by James Edward Little, whose scandalous life is related in these pages. The efforts of this man continue to haunt us far beyond his doubtlessly long-forgotten grave. Despite so many years of abuse and neglect, and aside from the good efforts of those who work so hard to assign their proper identity to them again, at their best these objects speak with a power and eloquence that transcends both history and culture. Noted contemporary artist José Bedia, who is also profi led in these pages, is an avid collector of “tribal art” (itself a misnomer used for convenience by many, including us) from around the world. For him, the art is less to be understood as to be experienced and “felt” for its quality of form and for the spiritual power it embodies and expresses. More than any other, his approach is why so much of this art has been preserved in the face of political chaos, misunderstanding, and misattribution. In the end, each artwork speaks for itself. Jonathan Fogel
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