Wahgi Valley, Western Highlands, PNG, mid-20thC.

These tall figures mounted on a carrying stick are known as bolimboku. They are made for important ceremonial gatherings that attract large groups of politically allied clans, including men, women and children. The central theme entails the killing of many pigs, often hundreds. The bolimboku appear at the crucial part of the ceremony, immediately before the pig killing. Men with these figures, and others sometimes wearing gourd masks, are hidden behind a high fence. They break through the fence and onto the dance ground with these figures carried by dancers on their backs, or in wide bark belts. The figures are decorated in similar ways to the dancers themselves; with feather headdress, shell body ornaments, and painted faces in bright colours.

This Highland figure is similar to those collected by Stan Moriarty in the 1960s (now in AGNSW collection) and two in the famous ‘seized collection’ of 1972 (now in PNG National Museum). Without doubt, this is of similar age (1960s-early 1970s) and is well preserved, unlike some others of the time. The figures were used only once, with the owners keeping feathers and shell ornaments. The face is made of a cotton cloth, painted red and yellow, but it seems all other materials are natural and traditional.

The figure was brought back to Australia in pre-Independence times (before 1975) and was preserved in a collection in Melbourne, Australia, until recently.