Money, Magic, Booze and Death: 10 Not-to-miss Artworks at the Bowers Museum

Throughout the Pacific region, teeth from a variety of animals were used for trade, personal adornment, and as status symbols. This necklace is strung on a brown fibrous strand with 203 human incisor, molar, and canine teeth from about 60 to 100 individuals. Documentation suggests that these teeth were claimed by warriors as trophies after a kill. Talk about fighting tooth and nail. 

 

This wooden figure carved with prominent antlers represents a tomb spirit or tomb guardian. The purpose of this horned figure was to protect the dead and exorcise intrusive demon spirits. Like this one, most tomb guardians depicted fantastic creatures with large eyes and protruding tongues!

 

Long before puka shells were fashionable accessories in this era, thinly carved shell beads were a common form of currency used by Native Americans in the Southern California region. Strung together on a long string, the value was determined by the size and polish of the shells.

 

If you fancied a cup of brandy during the late 1800s, you would have liked to be friends with Don Juan. This old copper brandy still belonged to early California landowner Don Juan Forster (an Englishman who became a Mexican citizen) who brought this - Southern California's first still. Don Juan had a reputation for producing fine liquors such as brandy, which was produced by both the missions and early rancheros for exchange with foreign traders. Brandy was also commonly used during this time for medicinal purposes.

 

 

This carved woman is endearingly called Mama Tau-tau among Bowers staff, though others feel that her realistic features are nightmare-inducing. Tau-tau from the Sa'Dan Toraja culture in Indonesia are sculpted to represent the deceased and the figures play a central role in elaborate funerals. To create a life-like appearance, the artists used real human hair and dressed the figure with the deceased’s favorite clothes and jewelry. After the funeral, the Tau-tau would be placed on a rock cliff with other carved effigies so that they could oversee the villages. 

 

Do you believe in magic? In the Melanesian culture of Papua New Guinea, traditional magic bags are used by powerful men, sorcerers, and healers for the business of healing or warding off evil spirits among villagers. This magic bag was created using assorted animal bones, stones, and fiber netting to hold precious talismans, healing stones, leaves, or other “magical” substances. In certain regions of New Guinea, the belief of sorcery continues to be very strong.

 

This haunting over-modeled human skull is a version of an ancestral portrait created as a funerary ritual object. Using clay, pigment, shells, and human hair, a skull was transformed from its cleaned out skeletal form into a realistic likeness of the deceased. This was done by a craftsman after the body was decomposed after a period of time. Cultures in the South Pacific Islands used this technique as forms of effigy for the dead, which were later carried and displayed in the village to be remembered and mourned.

 

You have to look up to see one of the biggest treasures of the Bowers Museum. Painted on the ceiling are themes of historic California with symbols and icons of the state such as the grizzly bear, Mission San Juan Capistrano, and covered wagons. The artist Martin Syversten and his assistant Karl Schabell were given room and board at a hotel nearby during the project to finish this coffered ceiling. It took them six months to complete and they finished in time for the museum dedication on December 1, 1932. Since it was completed during the Depression and the Bowers Museum did not open until 1936, instead of receiving a bonus they were promised at the end, they were only granted ten cents on the dollar about six years later. If you look closely at the mural, you will notice that the California seal painted by the artist differs from the official design. If you look even harder, you might find gold.