Archives: Art For Sale

A Fine Old First Australian Woomera Cape York Peninsula Queensland

This fine old Woomera is of elegant form and carved from hardwood, the top has the original wood peg where the spear is slotted when used. The woomera extends your arm’s length and greatly increases the distance the spear will travel.  The bottom has a cut bailer shell that is kept in place with resin or wax.  This type of woomera with the shell handle is unique to the Cape York Peninsula area in the Gulf of Carpenteria Queensland. Early 20th Century

Provenance: The Todd Barlin Collection of New Guinea Oceanic Art 

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A Fine Old First Australian Bardi People Shield West Australia

This finely carved shield with a herringbone design on the front and is coated with red ochre, the back has incised linear striations in horizontal bands. The deep lug handle and entire shield has an old use patina. Early 20th Century. Provenance Old West Australia Collection

One of the most beautiful motifs in aboriginal art is the herringbone design, a design prominent at one time or another in many parts of the world, including ancient Greece, China, and Peru.

Reference: Interlocking Key Design in Aboriginal Australian Decorative Art. Dr. D. S. Davidson First published: September 1949

Provenance: The Todd Barlin Collection of New Guinea Oceanic Art 

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If you have a similar “object” for sale please contact me for the best price and honest advice by a Government approved valuer 

To see many more rare items and the finest masterpieces, please make an appointment with us to visit the gallery.

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This fine and early Tiwi Ceremonial Dance Club is from either Melville or Bathurst islands in the eastern Timor Sea off the north coast of the Northern Territory of Australia. Carved from a single piece of hardwood, the forked club has deeply incised vertical striations over the entire surface from the top of the forks to the bottom grip and it is finely painted with ochre decoration with bands of colour and small dots. Late 19th Century, Old UK Collection

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To see many more rare items and the finest masterpieces, please make an appointment with us to visit the gallery.

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A Fine Old First Australian Painted Shield Central Australia

This finely carved and painted shield is from the Central Australia area.  The shield has incised linear striations on both sides and was coated with a background of red ochre. The front of the shield is brightly painted blue, red & yellow depicting an abstract snake outlined in blue. Painted shields were used for dancing during important ceremonies.

Provenance: The Todd Barlin Collection of New Guinea Oceanic Art 

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If you have a similar “object” for sale please contact me for the best price and honest advice by a Government approved valuer 

To see many more rare items and the finest masterpieces, please make an appointment with us to visit the gallery.

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Fine Old First Australians Hooked Boomerangs Tennant Creek Northern Territory of Australia Dating from the 19th Century

These beautiful old boomerangs are each carved from a single piece of hardwood, they are finely incised with fluting on the front surface and with traces of ochre painting, the back of the boomerangs are all finely adzed with traditional tools.  Hooked boomerangs were non-returning boomerangs, they were used to kill multiple birds when thrown into a dense flock. Boomerangs are multi-purpose tools that are used for hunting and could be wielded as clubs, used for digging, used to start friction fires, and as a musical instrument when two are struck together during ceremonial dancing.  With the dramatic hooked finial, they also look like an abstracted bird and the four together look amazing as pure forms.

Provenance: The Todd Barlin Collection of New Guinea Oceanic Art

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If you have a similar “object” for sale please contact me for the best price and honest advice by a Government approved valuer 

To see many more rare items and the finest masterpieces, please make an appointment with us to visit the gallery.

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A Fine Old New Guinea Shield Mendi Valley Southern Highlands Province Papua New Guinea

This beautiful old and well-used shield is from the Mendi Valley area of the Southern Highlands Province of  Papua New Guinea. This type of oval shield is called Worrumbi  in the local language and was used during tribal fighting with other nearby groups, there were regularly shifting alliances made & broken, and fighting over land boundaries was common.  A shield belonging to an important man became a family heirloom, and often a shield had a personal name and many stories were attached to it.  This shield shows significant age , the second image shows the dimpled carving and deep black glossy patina. Carved from a single piece of hardwood with an upraised central spine ending in a V shape at the top, there is a hole where feathers were sometimes tied as decorations, the rope handle is attached through two holes in the centre of the shield. Painted with red, white, and blue colours (the blue is likely from Rickets bleach Soap cake) that was highly valued as a colour that people did not have in their traditional pallet in ochre.  Early 20th Century

Provenance:   Field Collected in the Mendi Valley in 1985 and part of my private collection of shields that has been hanging on the wall in my house for 35 years

The Todd Barlin Collection of New Guinea Oceanic Art 

References:

In 1969 Mankind Magazine No . 7 Pages 59-66 There is an article ” The Style in New Guinea Highlands Shields ” by J.A. Abramson is one of the best articles with line drawings of the types of New Guinea Highlands Shields.

Shields of Melanesia ” 2005 Edited by Harry Beran & Barry Craig

This whole book mainly on New Guinea Shields is one of the best references ever published.  The excellent chapter on the Highlands of Papua New Guinea is the best reference book available on the subject. Twenty-Four of the Shields in this book are from my private collection: The Todd Barlin Collection

I helped write three chapters in the most important book on New Guinea Shields, ” Shields of Melanesia ” 2005  edited by Harry Beran and Barry Craig.  These were the chapters I wrote for this important reference book including a Chapter on the Asmat & South Coast of West Papua Irian Jaya Indonesia, Below

3.1 Shields from the North Coast of Western New Guinea: Pages 28- 32 : West Papua Irian Jaya Indonesia

5.1 The Shields of the Highlands of Western New Guinea : Pages 112- 1117  :  Yali Shields Central Highlands West Papua Irian Jaya Indonesia

6.1 Shields from the Southern Lowlands of Western New Guinea: Pages 155-165 : Four areas of  The Asmat People and Digul River areas.

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If you have a similar “object” for sale please contact me for the best price and honest advice by a Government approved valuer 

To see many more rare items and the finest masterpieces, please make an appointment with us to visit the gallery.

For all inquiries, please contact us.

 

See more Shields in Shields Gallery

A Fine Old New Guinea War Shield, Wahgi Valley, Western Highlands Papua New Guinea

This old and well-used shield was collected in the Wahgi Valley in the Western Highlands Province of Papua New Guinea in 1965 -1966 by a geologist working in New Guinea. The bold design is started by a punctated pecking that becomes the outline for the designs that are painted in yellow, white, and black colours. This shield has signs of being well used in fighting because of the many arrows and spearheads embedded in the front of the shield. Wahgi Valley Clans have a range of designs that they use on their shields, each design is likely to belong to a specific clan and can be easily recognized by enemies and clansmen alike. Warfare was widespread among traditional enemies in neighboring areas and alliances were made & broken regularly between groups. These large rectangular shields were used in battle by two men, one pushing the shield forward and another warrior hiding behind the shield and free to use his bow and arrows with great accuracy.  Old photos of fighting in the New Guinea Highlands show many warriors with shields facing off over a large space where people surge forward and then move back.  I have seen warriors standing on rural dirt roads with their shields expecting a fight, this was in the 1980s, and later when people acquired guns then shields became obsolete due to their not being effective against modern guns.  This shield has some small village repairs done with rattan which are part of the story of the shield, the overall condition of the shield is very good.  Hanging on the wall in my home it looks amazing.  The shield would have been made in the 1930s as it was old when collected in 1965.

Provenance: The Todd Barlin Collection of New Guinea Oceanic Art Art

I first went to Papua New Guinea in 1985 for an adventure & what I found was that I really enjoyed being with the people of New Guinea, over the next 38 years I spent extensive time spent collecting and documenting traditional art & ceremonies in remote areas of Papua New Guinea & West Papua, The Solomon Islands & Vanuatu & the other Pacific Islands countries. During these travels, I made major collections of New Guinea & Oceanic Art for major Museums and Public Art Galleries

I was honoured by being in the prestigious Louvre Museum Magazine for the collections I made for The Museum of African & Oceanic Art Paris in 1996 (now the Musee Quai Branly) for the exhibition “Asmat et Mimika d’ Irian Jaya April 1996 At THE MUSEE NATIONAL des ARTS D’AFRIQUE et d’ OCEANIE, Paris

See all of the links & photos in my new EXHIBITIONS GALLERY and there is the link to the article in the prestigious Louvre Magazine 1996

I have artwork for Museums & Art Galleries but also for collectors at every stage of their collecting. I want to encourage people to explore the fine art of New Guinea & West Papua and the Pacific Islands and to be able to see and touch the artworks in a relaxed and friendly manner in my Sydney Gallery.  I would like to invite you to visit my gallery and see the artworks in person and also look at my website www.oceanicartsaustralia.com  where there are many Galleries & Sub Galleries to explore.

My Gallery of nearly 40 years is the last physical gallery in Sydney that specialises in New Guinea & Oceanic Art. Sydney is just a couple hours’ flight to New Guinea & the Pacific Islands where all of these amazing artworks came from, Australia’s closest neighbours.

 

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If you have a similar “object” for sale please contact me for the best price and honest advice by a Government approved valuer 

To see many more rare items and the finest masterpieces, please make an appointment with us to visit the gallery.

For all inquiries, please contact us.

 

A Fine Old New Guinea War Shield Tijak Area, Remote Eastern Asmat Area, West Papua Irian Jaya Indonesia 

This old and well-used shield was collected on the Upper Eilanden River Area during a field trip in 1985.  At this time the people were still living nomadically in the forest in tree houses for safety. Sometimes you did not see any people going up the river but on the way down there would be men waiting on the river bank to see who was in their area from the sound of an outboard motor on my canoe.

This Shield was from the same people as the one published in the book ” Shields of Melanesia ” 2005 Edited by Harry Beran & Barry Craig. The chapter 6.1 pages 155 – 165 were written by me and the shield on page 161 Fig 6.8 is very likely to be by the same artist, the design is very close each other.

Asmat Shields were important objects that venerated their ancestors, each shield had a personal name and when invoked during warfare the enemy was said to be frightened or stunned and easy to kill. Old shields were family heirlooms.

I spent a lot of time in the Asmat region in the early 1980’s and old used Shields of this quality in the Coastal and Northwest Asmat Areas were rare. Many of the artworks I field collected then are now in major museum collections around the world including The Musee du Quai Branly Museum in Paris, when you walk into the Oceanic Art Pavilion at The Musee du Quai Branly the first thing you see are the monumental ancestor poles from the Asmat & Mimika along with Dance Costumes Shields and large Soul Canoe , all of these were field collected by me. Originally they were in an exhibition ” Asmat et Mimika at The National Museum of African and Oceanic Art in 1996 (now that museum is part of The Musee du Quai Branly).  The exhibition the Asmat and Mimika in 1996 was published in the prestigious Louvre Museum Magazine see the link below and a photo of the exhibition above.

Provenance: The Todd Barlin Collection of  New Guinea Oceanic & Indonesian Art

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If you have a similar “object” for sale please contact me for the best price and honest advice by a Government approved valuer 

To see many more rare items and the finest masterpieces, please make an appointment with us to visit the gallery.

For all inquiries, please contact us.