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"Ivory carving History."
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Bone, antler, ivory & horn : the technology of skeletal materials since the Roman period
\"Artefacts made from skeletal materials since the Roman period were, before this book, neglected as a serious area of study. This ... account, which reviews over fifty categories of artefact, ... starts with a consideration of the formation, morphology, and mechanical properties of the materials and illuminates characteristics concerning working with them. Following chapters discuss the organisation of the industry and trade in such items, including the changing status of the industry over time\"--Amazon.com.
Book
Seeing, Believing, and (Mis)Understanding: A Case Study on Sino-Portuguese Ivory Sculpture of the Virgin and Child in Late Ming
In the name of God and profit, Jorge Álvares, the first Portuguese to set foot in China, arrived in 1513 and opened a new chapter for missionary work. One of the most significant forms of “Sino-Portuguese” decorative art, ivory sculpture, is closely linked to the Portuguese mission in the Orient and serves as a witness to encounters between different cultures and religions. This study focuses on representative Sino-Portuguese ivory sculptures of the Virgin and Child from the Late Ming period through a detailed analysis of iconography and a comparative visual critique with European prototypes and Guanyin representations to discuss the significance of missionary visual imagery in cultural interactions. The ivory sculpture of the Virgin and Child is not merely an image; it is a physical object with both material and visual characteristics, acquiring its religious significance during the missionary process. The present study aims to present its artistic hybridity and demonstrate how the Chinese carvers make the Sino-Portuguese “speak” different visual languages, leading to different interpretations. It also reflects the cultural translation that occurs in the complex process of religious contact. In this space of ‘culture in between’, Christianity has been able to transcend cultural and religious boundaries.
Journal Article
Ivory Carving in Yakutia
Within Russia, the major centers of bone carving art are the village of Kholmogory in the Arkhangelsk region, the town of Tobolsk in the Tyumen region (which was considered the center of Siberia in the seventeenth century), Chukotka, and the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). Geographically, they are connected by their proximity to the northern seas, which explains the main materials used by carvers: walrus tusk and sperm whale tooth. The exception is Sakha (Yakutia), the ancient motherland of mammoths. This article discusses the origin and history of the development of Sakha mammoth tusk carving, the role of ethnocultural contacts at different stages of its development, and the preservation of its authenticity.
Journal Article
Teaching with and about the Ivory Art from Chukotka and the Bering Strait (Research Note)
This article relates a pedagogical approach to exploring current directions in the art made with walrus ivory in Chukotka, Russia. Noting the unprecedented and rapidly expanding diversity in the forms and techniques documented over the course of recent ethnographic research, the article outlines a set of ideas and contexts helpful in examining contemporary practices in walrus ivory art. These include a present-day ethnography of the buyer market and its influence on artistic production, a chronology of pertinent developments during the Soviet and post-Soviet periods, and the author’s take, as that of a practicing artist, on differentiating between the formal and conceptual functions of the imagery found in Bering Strait archaeological materials and the recontextualization of this imagery within present-day practices in Chukotka.
Journal Article
The Significance of Social Gestures and Technologies of Embellishment in Paleolithic Portable Art
This paper analyzes the gestures and technologies used to make Paleolithic portable art. Contextualized within the theoretical schools of the anthropology of technology and using the chaîne opératoire methodology, the approach advanced here quantifies the relationships between technology, society, and aesthetics in the production of Paleolithic art. Focusing on Pavlovian art, dating to between 28,000 and 24,000 radiocarbon years BP, this paper assesses the suite of art production technologies, particularly those used when modifying and decorating ivory, and traces the relationship between decorative techniques and other characteristics of art. These analyses offer insight into Pavlovian art traditions and the emergence of innovative techniques in Paleolithic societies.
Journal Article
Eskimo Art Prototypes in the Chinese Neolithic: A Comparison of Okvik/Old Bering Sea and Liangzhu Ritual Art
One of the central decorative features of the Okvik/Old Bering Sea (OBS) Eskimo art is a theriomorphic design with an eyelike circle-dot motif. Seventy-five years ago, Henry B. Collins proposed the resemblance between OBS animal motifs and the Taotie (or t'ao t'ieh) faces on Chinese Shang and Zhou bronze wares. However, today his conclusion is based on outdated archaeological data. New evidence in recent decades indicates that the Chinese Bronze Age Taotie originated from mask-like imagery on jade objects of the Liangzhu Neolithic culture, third millennium BC in the Lower Yangtze River region. Comparative studies suggest more similarities in artistic designs between Okvik/OBS and Liangzhu jade than between Okvik/OBS culture and the Shang/Zhou Bronze Age cultures. The prototype theriomorphic design in Okvik/OBS Eskimo art, therefore, may originate from Liangzhu rather than from Shang and Zhou. Keywords: Bering Strait, China, Liangzhu culture, Okvik/Old Bering Sea culture, prehistory, theriomorphic design
Journal Article
The “Ivory Tomb” at Tell Irbid, Jordan: Intercultural Relations at the End of the Late Bronze Age and the Beginning of the Iron Age
The discovery of a tomb with remarkable contents at Tell Irbid, Jordan, in the center of the modern town, sheds light on the intercultural relations of the inhabitants of northern Jordan during the latter part of the Late Bronze Age and the beginning of the Iron Age. The tomb comprises a single burial chamber for one female of high rank. She had been buried with ceramic vessels and small finds, including jewelry. Outstanding finds of ivory from her tomb include two exquisitely carved boxes, one of them with a lid, and one palette with carved lions. Even more remarkable is a unique object of ivory with the carved decoration of an ungulate. The ivories from Irbid constitute the largest collection of such finds from this period in Jordan. This tomb, while featuring luxurious ivory objects of the highest artistic standard and some other precious items which could have been kept for quite a long period, contained only simple, locally produced pottery. This could point to a break in intercultural relations and a rupture in trade. The present article concentrates on the presentation of the tomb material—especially the ivories and the pottery—and chronology, the rank of the deceased, and intercultural relations.
Journal Article
Double Historiography: France and Sierra Leone: The Luso-African Ivories at the Quai Branly
Reviews the exhibition \"Ivoires d'Afrique dans les anciennes collections françaises\" (African ivories from old French collections), which was on display at the Musée du Quai Branly in Paris from 19 February-11 May 2008.
Journal Article