139 LEFT: Roof spire, New Caledonia. New Caledonian art is very specifi c in style and extremely expressive. Here the sculptor goes even beyond this. With what magic did he conceive the thinly constructed face that surmounts a gigantic geometric jaw without its being shocking? Indeed, it is very much the contrary. Rendered in strong relief, all the elements of the face are underscored with intentional voids, as well as by now absent elements that have been removed by time, the latter a testament to the object’s great age. Is not sculpture the art of making voids speak? In sculpture, as in music, the beautiful emerges from voids and from silence. This work eloquently reminds us of that. ADAM, fi g. 80. ABOVE: Head, Enggano, Indonesia. The masterfulness of this highly developed art form from a tiny Indonesian island demonstrates that Polynesians once embarked from this region on extended voyages that brought them to places thousands of miles from their point of departure. The immense eyes, the threatening mouth, the white shell inlay—everything about this head is reminiscent of the dynamic art of Hawaii. Sadly, this island was emptied of its inhabitants, once encountered by Elio Modigliani. It became a prison, and its art production died along with its people. Today one must visit the Museo di Antropologia in Florence to see the Enggano works that this great ethnologist brought to Europe at the beginning of the twentieth century. The island’s art is well represented there, including house posts and spires, sculpted doors, fi gurative elements from canoes, and examples of the astonishing epacu hats worn by the women of the island, which was also known as Île des Dames. It seems Modigliani collected every sculpture he could fi nd on the island, as they are extremely rare in private collections. Ana and Antonio discovered this head, which probably served as a prow decoration on a boat. It was collected by a German who was stranded on the island but rescued prior to Modigliani’s visit there. The latter did not collect anything similar to it. Another object of this kind is known in the collection of the Leiden Museum, but it is artistically inferior to this example. With its wide-open mouth, this is a dynamic and expressive work that was clearly intended to instill fear. The large elements of shell inlay in the eyes, the mouth, and the ears amplify the intended effect. ADAM, fi g. 142.
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