ART on view 86 journals on the subject, published in Europe, North America, and South America. In 1989 the director of the Fresno Art Museum in California approached me about curating an exhibition of Amazonian material culture. It opened in 1990 and was accompanied by a modest catalog. This event was the fi rst exhibition I curated on this subject, but it was also remarkable in that it consequently resulted in the fi rst donation gifted to the Mekler Collection. An elderly gentleman, Mr. Heinz Kusel, introduced himself to me during the show. He told me that he had escaped Nazi Germany in 1938 and settled in Pucallpa, Peru, where he had a small store on the outskirts of town. He asked me to come and look at some items in the trunk of his car. I gasped when I saw an incredible Shipibo-Conibo tari, or tunic (fi g. 1). Mr. Kusel told me that in 1939 he had observed a Shipibo woman who spun cotton yarn from native cotton fi bers and then proceeded to erect a loom, on which she wove and then painted this tari. When she fi nished, almost a year later, she traded it for two beers. I offered to purchase the tunic, but Mr. Kusel insisted on gifting it along with thirty additional Shipibo objects, as long as I added the tunic to the exhibition, which I did. Over the years, donors like Mr. Kusel continued FIG. 5 (right): Mask/body costume, iwata. Kamayurá, Ipavu Lake, Brazil. Early second half of the 20th century. Wood, genipap, urucu and mineral pigments, buriti fi ber, wax, cane, freshwater shells, feathers. H: 213 cm. Collection of the Houston Museum of Natural Science, inv. 2009.1841.15. These costumes are worn by shamans during healing rituals. They are danced in pairs. FIG. 4 (above): Dorsal headdress, worn by married women with children during specifi c name-giving ceremonies. Kayapó-Mekrãgnoti, Iriri River, Brazil. Second half of the 20th century. Palm frond ribs, cotton fi ber, oropendola feathers. H: 112 cm. Collection of the Houston Museum of Natural Science, inv. 2007.1782.03.
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