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Object Name: Male figure
Place of Origin: Admiralty Islands, Papua New Guinea
Date/Era: 19th-early 20th century
Medium/Materials: Wood, pigment
Credit Line: Gift of the Wellcome Trust
Accession Number: X65.4990
This figure, memorializing a prominent male ancestor, once flanked the door of a house in the Admiralty Islands and later belonged to the prominent French Surrealists Andr Breton (1896-1966) and Paul Eluard (1895-1952). Like Picasso, Breton and Eluard were collectors of African and Pacific art, a passion that influenced their work and ultimately the course of European artistic and literary traditions.
Source: Gallery text, Intersections: World Arts, Local Lives, 2006