Flywhisk (tahiri ra’a)
James Morrison, a crew member of HMS Bounty, who accompanied that vessel’s infamous mutineers on a short-lived attempt to settle the island of Tupua’i in 1789, leaves us the earliest description of the imagery of these iconic art works which were used by Austral Island chiefs:
‘The Old Men have walking Staves & handles of Fly flaps made of the same wood, highly finished, on the Top of their Staves they generally have Carved a double figure of a man representing a figure with one Body & two Heads & some of two, standing back to back, their Fly flaps are made of the Fibers of the Cocoa Nut twisted & plaited very Curiously.’ (James Morrison, cited in Thomas and Smith, 2013)
The finely carved finial figure in this example has a pair of curving heads which bow forward, tapering to a proboscis-like tip. Two sets of rectilinear arms extend from the figure’s narrow shoulders to frame a single teardrop-shaped body. A series of delicately executed notches distinguishes precise detail in each figure, outlining the contoured edges of limbs – legs, feet, and abstracted hands which appear to be clasped, elbows nearly resting on the knees. Facial features are reduced to a single brow line, bisected by a central ridge that represents the nose and extends over the top of the head as a crest. The peg-like projections on the forehead represent ornamental topknots of hair, a coiffure worn by man of chiefly rank in the Austral Islands. The form of each topknot is echoed by the navel (pito) which projects from the center of the torso. These figures represent the earliest line of deified ancestors, supernatural beings who inhabited a primordial era alluded to in their saurian, or reptile-like, features.
Commonly referred to as ‘flywhisks’, these elegant upright sculptures have long been misunderstood, suffering from overly literal interpretations that overlook their deeper cosmological significance. Dynamism is implied in the name atua (or a-tua), the collective term for Polynesian gods, which refers to revolving or turning repeatedly around a central axis. This spinning motion is manifest in the carving of this tahiri particularly in its highly abstract finial, which seems to be doubled but actually represents a single figure in motion. The figure’s feet taper elegantly into four pairs and appear to delicately side-step around the central shaft when the tahiri is rotated on its vertical axis. The same action causes a series of circular spools and rounded discs to appear to descend downwards along the length of the wooden shaft whose lower section is bound with lengths of reddish-colored coconut fiber cord and human hair. These are highly significant materials that refer to genealogical relations between the current generation of chiefly men and their forbears. The springy coconut-fiber whisk element at the bottom further reinforces a sensation of movement and spinning. Sections of polished pearl shell tied into the bindings of tahiri would have flashed and jangled when twirled, creating the luminosity and sound that created the appropriate conditions for ritual, enhancing the efficacy of its principal objective – to summon forth the gods from the dark reaches of the ancestral realm (te po) into the light of day (te ao).
Maia Nuku, 2020 Evelyn A. J. Hall and John A. Friede Associate Curator for Oceanic Art
Published
Kjellgren, Eric. Oceania: Art of the Pacific Islands in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, pp. 299-300, no. 180. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007
Nuku, Maia. ATEA: Nature and Divinity in Polynesia. The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, Winter 2019, pp. 38-41
Further reading
Thomas, Nicholas and Vanessa Smith (eds.) Mutiny and Aftermath: James Morrison's Account of the Mutiny on the Bounty and the Island of Tahiti. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2013
Artwork Details
- Title: Flywhisk (tahiri ra’a)
- Date: Early–mid-19th century
- Geography: French Polynesia, Austral Islands
- Culture: Rurutu or Tupua'I Island
- Medium: Wood, coconut fiber, human hair
- Dimensions: H. 30 1/4 × W. 6 × D. 2 3/8 in. (76.8 × 15.2 × 6 cm)
- Classification: Wood-Implements
- Credit Line:
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Bequest of Nelson A. Rockefeller, 1979
- Object Number: 1979.206.1487
- Curatorial Department: The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing
Audio
1774. Tahiri ra'a (fly whisk), Mā'ohi artist
Maia Nuku
MAIA NUKU: This tahiri would’ve been spun or turned or twisted to beckon into the light the gods; to create a channel of communication, a vortex, almost, down which a god or divine spirit could arrive.
That term tahiri also means “to beckon.”
Tēnā koutou katoa, I am Maia Nuku and I am the curator for Oceania here at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
This tahiri ra’a was used as a means to encourage the presence of divinity during ritual practice in an island group called the Austral Islands, which is roughly 700 kilometers south of Tahiti.
KATERINA TEAIWA (NARRATOR): Many aspects of the carving point to its spinning function. First, look at the figure on top. It’s doubled… or is it?
MAIA NUKU: It’s a single figure that was spun, and in spinning it, you would see a multiplication. The figure has four pairs of feet that flare out. It’s as if you’re seeing those feet having been spun.
KATERINA TEAIWA: The long-nosed figure represents a first generation of pre-human ancestors.
MAIA NUKU: Those early ancestors were conceived of as reptile-like or bird-like, so the facial features of this carving speak to that kind of ‘other than human’ aspect.
KATERINA TEAIWA: You’ll notice that the navel, known in Tahitian as te pito, is prominent.
MAIA NUKU: The navel was really a portal or a center that was like a channel between Te Po and Te Ao, these two complementary cosmological realms.
KATERINA TEAIWA: Te Po is the realm of the gods, and Te Ao is the realm of the living.
MAIA NUKU: And these ritual objects are really a way to navigate the potent threshold between those two realms.
KATERINA TEAIWA: In the past, missionaries and scholars referred to these objects as “fly whisks,” and assumed they were used to keep flies off food. But look at the central shaft, which is wrapped with both light-colored coconut fiber and darker human hair.
MAIA NUKU: You would not integrate human hair into something as mundane as a fly whisk. Human hair has a particular currency in terms of ritual value because, in a sense, it is the condensed lineage of your forebears, so it’s really indicating to you that this is a very sacred, or tapu, item.
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Music: Courtesy of Ètārētia Porotetani Māòhi
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