30 - OCEANIA: TONGA ISLANDS (?)

OCEANIA: TONGA ISLANDS (?) Large tapa on canvas-backed bark. Decorated with blue, red, and black geometric motifs arranged in a beautifully balanced composition L.: 185 cm – W.: 150 According to family oral tradition, this tapa was a gift from the explorer Pierre Dominique Gaisseau to the mother of the current owner, a young painter and student of René Iché, known as Sam. Gaisseau met this young artist at the family-owned Parisian bakery he frequented, where she was exhibiting a few paintings. They became close friends, and whenever he returned from an expedition, the current owner’s mother would help unspool the film reels. We owe to this explorer and documentary filmmaker, who passed away in 1997, the film *Le Ciel et la Boue* (The Sky and the Mud), which won the 1962 Oscar for Best Documentary Feature, as well as several books, including *Forêt sacrée* (Sacred Forest), *Magie et rites secrets des Toma* (published in 1953), a book that remains a standard reference on the subject to this day. Formerly part of the collection of Dr. Frédéric André Wetzel, a physician, cultural figure in Munster, and close friend and collaborator of Albert Schweitzer. The collection was subsequently passed down and expanded by his son, a pharmacist based in Lambaréné (Gabon) and later in Côte d’Ivoire, according to oral family tradition. See biography in the sale listing