The Ninth Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art

161 ARTISTS Page 158 From top: HERMAN SOMUK Tavaux forcés (imposed labour) c.1942–43 Crayon on paper / 20.5 x 26.5cm Tir des alliés (shooting allies) c.1942–43 Crayon on paper / 20.5 x 26.5cm / Collection: Musée d’Oceanie la La Neylière, France GREGORY DAUSI MOAH (Tsuhana and feast) 1972 Pen and fibre tipped pen on paper / 30.5 x 75cm / Private collection of Marilyn Frances Havini Opposite: GREGORY DAUSI MOAH Roko figure in Tsuhana (Chiefs meeting house) 1977 Colour print / Photograph and image courtesy: Bob Miller The resulting works feature scenes of combat and violence: people running from burning houses and portraits of crying figures. The church is a recurring motif, acknowledging the importance of faith and the church as a place of refuge and healing. At times directly referencing Somuk’s compositions, these paintings project the artists’ experience of their dramatically changing world onto a broader stage. Marking moments of invention in the tradition of memorialisation, these three bodies of work represent the ongoing dynamism of aesthetic practice in Bougainville and the way artists continue to assert agency in the face of change. These works, though addressing different historical periods and using different mediums, affirm an ongoing lineage of cultural and artistic knowledge, which can be traced through several generations. Ruth McDougall Endnotes 1 Anthropologist Beatrice Blackwood documents the use of kokorra (human figures) in various ‘aesthetic arts’ in Both Sides of Buka Passage: An Ethnographic Study of Social, Sexual and Economic Questions in the North-Western Solomon Islands , Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1935, pp.430–5. 2 Somuk travelled extensively throughout Buka parishes and to Bougainville as far as Wakunai, Torokina and Kunua. 3 Patrick O’Reilly, Art Mélanésien: Somuk, Hikot, Tsumomok, Tsimes, Ketanon , Nouvelles editions latines, Paris, 1951, p.8. 4 O’Reilly exhibited Somuk’s work in Paris in 1950. Séjour á Bougainville, îles Salomons 1934–35 is in the Collection of the Musée du Quai Branly Jacques Chirac in Paris. 5 The church still stands with its painted apse and side panels and the remains of its woven ceiling by Moah and his team. A wooden carving by Moah of the Madonna holding the Christ child remains on the side altar, though three baptismal fonts carved by Moah for each entrance are now missing. 6 Destroyed during the Bougainville conflict of the 1990s, these totems were carved by a team led by Moah, including Leo Kabun, Joseph Patik, Arapis Menas and Leo Gegeta. 7 Moah’s son Thomas Sougai recounts that this decoration was not customary, but done as a favour to give validity to the decoration of the nearby church; traditionally, carvings and paintings were made and kept by men in secret locations in the forest. Thomas Sougai, interview with Ruth McDougall, Gagan, 29 April 2018. 8 Moah was living with Marilyn and Moses Havini at this time; he was one of a number of senior artists Marilyn, a teacher, brought in to conduct workshops to encourage young people to engage with artistic practices. 9 The Bougainville conflict erupted in Central Bougainville in 1988 over environmental concerns and the distribution of royalties associated with the highly profitable Panguna copper and gold mine owned by Bougainville Copper Limited, a subsidiary of Conzinc Riotinto Australia. Thousands of civilians were caught in the conflict between the Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA) and the Papua New Guinea Defence Force. The accompanying decade-long conflict resulted in more than 15 000 deaths, an almost total destruction of infrastructure, and a disruption to formal education, affecting generations. A peace agreement was signed in 2001.