76 The inhabitants of the Sepik River area believe that it was created by the act of a primordial being. A myth tells the story of a crocodile giving birth to the earth by thrashing its tail in the water around it. This caused the earth to congeal, and as it accumulated, the banks of the river were formed. Another myth holds that the earth was created by a snake that gathered up clumps of earth in its mouth and spit them out methodically and effi ciently in such a way as to create land. In any event, people were quick to settle on the river’s banks. According to Christian Kaufmann, one of the leading specialists in the area, human beings added artifi cial images to this real world—sculptures, dances, musical instruments, as well as men’s houses, which, according to their beliefs, fl oat like grass islands on the ceremonial places. All of these elements, whether ancestor fi gures, masks, house posts, gable ornaments, roof spires, and whether static or movable, are commemorations of the founding ancestors. These latter, as the myths noted above demonstrate, can appear in various forms, whether human, crocodile, snake, pig, fl ying fox, or bird.1 Such a wide-ranging enumeration of forms refl ects the variability of the perceived world as well as its transcription into images. It allows for an understanding of what an amazing but often discordant place the Sepik is. That is not only because there are a surprising number of cultural groups (some thirty-eight in the area covered by the exhibition) that live in an area a few hundred kilometers across and have been there for several centuries, but also, and most importantly, because those groups have developed extremely complex rituals. Objects, often made of unex- ART on view S E P I K FIG. 1 (left): Female fi gure. Attributed to the Lower Sepik or Ramu River region, Papua New Guinea. Wood, fi ber, feathers, shell. H: 50 cm. Musée du Quai Branly, Paris, inv. 71.1939.127.90. © Musée du Quai Branly. Photo: Thierry Ollivier, Michael Urtado. FIG. 2 (above): Door lintel with sculpted heads. Iatmul, Papua New Guinea. Sago palm, fi ber, rattan, pigment (white, black, yellow ocher). L: 508.5 cm. Acquired in 1963 by Hermann Lissauer (Melbourne) during the Jean Guiart expedition. Musée du Quai Branly, Paris, inv. 72.1964.11.9 1-2-3. © Musée du Quai Branly. Photo: Claude Germain. FIG. 3 (right): Carved panel. Singarin village, Papua New Guinea. Wood, black patina, pigment. Collected on October 15, 1935, by Monique de Ganay during the La Korrigane expedition. Musée du Quai Branly, Paris, inv. 70.2010.25.1 © Musée du Quai Branly. Photo: Claude Germain.
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