Keith Jackson & Friends: PNG ATTITUDE

Exploring PNG’s interior & dangerously gritty Moresby

PEABODY MUSEUM OF ARCHAEOLOGY & ETHNOLOGY

Papua New Guinea portraits & diaries. From the series ‘Portraits’ by Stephen Dupont, part of his Robert Gardner Fellowship in Photography. Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology, Cambridge, Massachusetts. 2 May - 2 September 2013

THE PEABODY MUSEUM of Archaeology and Ethnology at Harvard University in the United States will next month present a new exhibition on Papua New Guinea by award-winning Australian photographer Stephen Dupont.

As the Museum’s 2010 Robert Gardner Photography Fellow, Dupont returned to PNG and explored the mountainous Highlands, the serpentine Sepik River and the dangerously gritty capital city, Port Moresby.

Don’t say ethnic or tribal - the word is ‘customary’

ANNA SOMERS COCKS | The Art Newspaper

IN LONDON LAST NOVEMBER, the director of the Tate Gallery, Nicholas Serota, said that it would be spending around £2m a year—40% of its acquisitions budget—on art from outside Europe and North America.

The Guggenheim and Museum of Modern Art in New York have announced similar policies.

The question is, how to find out about art and artists in areas of the world that often do not have an evolved gallery system or, indeed, a defined history of contemporary art (what does “contemporary” mean, for example, in Papua New Guinea or, indeed, in China?).

There is one museum that has been working on this long before everyone else: the Queensland Art Gallery in Brisbane, which 20 years ago held the first Asia Pacific Triennial.

In 2006, the gallery opened the Gallery of Modern Art, forming Qagoma, whose acting director Suhanya Raffel says: “We now accept that contemporary art is syncretic and cross-cultural, that canonical assumptions about art history are routinely questioned.”

For this year’s star billing, Papua New Guinea, the Gallery of Modern Art has collaborated with the artists and the architect Martin Fowler, who grew up in PNG and has designed Papua New Guinea’s museum.

The first thing you see when you go into the Gallery of Modern Art is a huge painted gable of the kind found on ritual buildings in East Sepik.

Anyone can enjoy its splendid decorative qualities, but all kinds of ritual meanings are also bound up in it, and these have been respected by the gallery.

We are told that the senior artist of the team that came to Brisbane to paint it said the big spirit man, Puti, represented at the top of the gable, gave him permission to make this spirit house in Australia and to use synthetic polymer paints.

One may smile, but it is in earnest. There are also wonderfully decorative Papua New Guinean full-body masks.

The gallery has a good word for this art: “customary”, that is, the product of customs, which is much better than “ethnic” or, worse still, “tribal”, epithets that consign such work to the anthropological compound.

A stimulating essay in the catalogue is about how customary art is not static, as we tend to think, but evolves according to criteria of its own and in response to outside events. The message is: we have a lot to learn.

Sepik artists create dazzling cultural display in Brisbane

SEVEN KWOMA ARTISTS from the East Sepik have created a dazzling series of paintings and carvings for the 7th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art at Brisbane’s Queensland Gallery of Modern Art.

The paintings and carvings have been combined within a large-scale structure based on the customary kurrumbu (spirit house).

The kurrumbu plays an important role in Kwoma cultural life and is used regularly by community members as a place where they can gather to discuss important issues, hold ceremonies and initiate new social and cultural developments.

The ceilings, structural posts and internal furniture of the kurrumbu are decorated with paintings and carvings that are closely tied to creation stories and clan designs.

The presence of the ancestral spirits embodied by the works assists community members in their decision making process, energises ceremony and inspires new ideas.

For the Gallery to feature the Sepik carvings and art in such a prominent display is a powerful recognition of PNG art and culture.

The exhibition opened yesterday and runs until 14 April.

The artists are:

Anton Waiawas, b.1952, Tongwinjamb village
Rex Maukos, b.1960, Tongwinjamb village
Kevin Apsepa, b.1971, Ambunti village
Terry Pakiey, b.1974, Tongwinjamb village
Simon Goiyap, b.1973, Mino village
Nelson Makamoi, b.1982, Tongwinjamb village
Jamie Jimok, b.1982, Tongwinjamb village

Wahgi Hellcats: a rock band ‘born before its time’

KELA KAPKORA SIL BOLKIN | Supported by the Phil Fitzpatrick Writing Fellowship

THE WAHGI HELLCATS was a famous rock band in the Papua New Guinea music industry well before the Australian flag was lowered in 1975.

The band was humbly born in the Minj area of the Jiwaka Province in December 1973. The founder was a self-taught musician who started with a ukulele in 1963.

Pat Siwi (pictured) was only 18 years old when he started the band and since then he has become a household name.

He is now among PNG’s top music icons, just like the late John Wong, George Telek and Henry Peni.  His Wahgi Hellcats also sits comfortably among other top bands like Barike, Painim Wok, April Sun and Sirosis.

In the 1960s, young Pat had a very close friend, David Peri, who was a half caste Simbu-Sepik.

Pat and David attended Minj primary school and soon realized they both liked music. At the same time, they found one of Pat Siwi’s cousins, Siwi Muruk, who was also half caste Simbu-Sepik and who also liked music.

Pat, David and Siwi officially came together and formed a band in December 1973.  They named it the Wahgi Hellcats.

In those nostalgic days Pat was the main vocalist and played guitar. David was the harmonist and played bass guitar. Siwi had the drums perfectly under control.

They started playing around clubs using borrowed instruments. Most of the equipment was borrowed from the University of Technology where Pat was an architecture student from 1971 to 1973.

Since the birth of the Wahgi Hellcats many other musicians have come and gone, but the band has satisfied the test of time.

Siwi Muruk was a bit of a humbug and Pat had to keep an eye on him all the time. Fortunately, Pat was a natural leader and he kept the group together and the legacy they left in the highlands and the PNG music industry stands head to head with other consistent performers like Barike, Painim Wok, April Sun and Sirosis.

Pat Siwi’s leadership abilities were not a fluke. He is from the Enduga tribe of the Simbu Province and his mother is from Enga. Pat’s mother is from the first sister; Peter Ipatas, the proactive and popular veteran Enga Governor, is from the second sister. And Daniel Kapi, a former MP, is from the third sister.

“I thought I was born before my time. There was no music industry in PNG when I started,” said Pat.

The writers of our songs are the true national leaders

GANJIKI D WAYNE | Supported by the Bea Amaya Writing Fellowship

“Let me write the songs of a nation: I don’t care who writes the laws” - Andrew Fletcher, Scottish politician

WHEN HE FIRST TOOK OFFICE I used to hear news about Governor Powes Parkop’s vision to clean the city and the people’s mindsets by the year 2012.

With that year coming to an end now, how have we fared? Have we changed?

Parkop posed the question to a workshop of certain middle level bureaucrats, “How do we get people to change their mindsets and attitudes?” Indeed: “How?”

Mindsets and attitudes cannot be legislated or regulated into being. They exist free of the external things we set up to control society.

Conscience is the freest component of a human person. Inserted and guaranteed by God Himself. I could even say that the freedom of conscience is a freedom more precious than liberty itself.

Throughout history and even today people have sacrificed their physical freedom and even their lives to keep their consciences free. And the most powerful of people have been those who have been able to permeate people’s conscience.

Leadership, I heard from Myles Munroe, is the ability to influence human behaviour. Human behaviour is a product of the human conscience. Leadership is therefore the ability to influence the human conscience to such an extent as it affects human behaviour.

All these matters considered, I have concluded who the real leaders of this nation are.

They are not the prime ministers, the members of parliament or the nation’s top bureaucrats. They are not the ones who possess power or control over vast amounts of money or land or people. They are not those who have many wives and massive wealth; or who drive successful businesses and expensive vehicles.

For me, the true leaders are smaller people. They probably live with relatives because they can’t afford rentals. Maybe they make their homes in settlements. They possibly have small blue-collar jobs that they struggle through every day.

But they are famous people. Known and loved by many who share the same everyday experiences they do. They are the local songwriters, singers, poets, writers and the storytellers. But I’ll focus on the songwriters and singers because that segment of the arts has more dominion in PNG than the storytelling, books and poetry.

The majority in this nation listens to music and song every day. And songs have the ability to stick and continually play in the minds of people.

The words, aided by music, can seep easily into our subconscious, shaping the mindset without us even knowing it.

When we constantly listen to the same thing we usually end up believing it—without even making a conscious decision to start believing. Sooner or later we start living out the kind of beliefs transmitted by the songs. Our behaviour is affected.

Human behaviour is shaped by what we constantly hear, see and read—by what is constantly communicated to us. Politicians can deliver speeches once in a while but their words do not dwell in our minds and hearts as much as songs and music.

Hence politicians, despite having the authority to make laws and the macro-decisions for the country, do not have much influence on the people’s behaviour. That privilege (or responsibility) lies with our song-writers and singers.

The problem, however, is that many popular local songs are full of negative themes such as self-pity and regret, low self-esteem, loss of hope (“I give up”) etc. They are uninspiring and narrow-minded. They stimulate fleeting desires that can never be satisfied.

Bougainville stories come flooding back in new play

BRIAN KARLOVSKY | Hornsby Advocate (Sydney)

IT'S 20 YEARS SINCE former London Times journalist Robert Cockburn, who was covering the Bougainville conflict, reported for his newspaper and the BBC on the murder of a young Bougainvillean bus driver.

But the chilling scene and the saga of a mining company's activities prompting civil war in Bougainville, is set to be brought to life in a fictional drama, Hotel Hibiscus, at the Zenith Theatre this month.

"There was the murder of a young village bus driver, who I found in the mortuary," Mr Cockburn, 59, said. "I felt so moved because it was an innocent who was caught up and shot and that's where the play began. It was very immediate and very personal."

Set on fictional Hibiscus Island in Papua New Guinea, Hotel Hibiscus is a brutally revealing account of Australian involvement in the six year "dirty war" on Bougainville.

Mr Cockburn, who also covered the Maralinga Royal Commission while Australian correspondent for The Times, said there were still a lot of questions to be answered.

"There was a recent announcement in the US Supreme Court where it had given them permission to bring a case on genocide and war crimes against the miners operating at Bougainville at that time," he said.

"That case is on going and brings the story right up to date and throws it into the future. I will be watching with a professional eye what happens in the court case."

Hotel Hibiscus is an Australian political thriller that questions our complicity and silence in war crimes carried out just 20 years ago. Thornleigh resident Robert Cockburn wrote it while he reported on the Bougainville conflict in the 1990s.

Photo: Kristi Miller

Sonnet 4: Before wet Adjectives the mighty Verb!

MICHAEL DOM

It seems some writer’s pleasure to conjure
Words of shimmering beauty, rich and rare
Verbose prose, wrought in great style and glamour
Express and expose; whose cupboards are bare?

It’s all about me and the things I see
My feelings and thinkings and fantasies
It’s all about them, what they did to me
Their foibles and turmoils and angst at me

Let a word put in edgewise be sharper
To cut to the chase, to search and to sow
To draw a map to a hidden treasure
To plant a seed so a mustard tree grows

Why write of our sorrow and misery?
Why not instead rewrite our history?

An old acquaintance – Mr Angry Anger

POYAP JAMES ROONEY

I know you! I see you! I now know you, I didn’t before.

You were here yesterday, last week; last month… you’ve been around a while haven’t you?

You know your way around, you know your paths of least resistance, and you know how to recognise your victims - the naïve, defenceless beings yet to learn your conniving ways, yet to recognise you through your crafty disguises.

You’re a smooth operator, suave, you know how to mingle, charm and entice your victims.

You’ve many a-times pretended and convince me that we were friends -

“I’m your friend, I’ll give you strength” I’ve heard you whisper many times before, and I believed you, oh did I believe you.

You convinced me our combination was invincible, indestructible and I thought we could do anything together and no matter what? No-one could ever touch us. You fuelled me with righteous indignation, which severed my power of reason, my rationality, and my mind.  Such was your luring influence, you master of illusion.

In our passion fuelled frenzies we built houses of cards and on numerous occasions you led me to the precipice of my life and tried to convince me against my mind that I could fly.  But then it all came tumbling down on me, I imploded as reality compressed around me while you, you disappeared into thin air.

Once again I found myself alone, floating in the middle of the ocean of life on that wooden thatched raft which is reality, which is existence, which is nature.

I forgive myself, for I am human and I am alive.  I am, therefore I can and will think.  I now know you are an effect, not a cause.  I, and I alone have within me the power to cause the effects I desire.  It may take a while, but there is land on this Earth, and I’ll get there on this wooden raft of mine.

We’ll meet again and I might even invite you to sail with me on occasions, but on my terms, I’ll be in control… not you.

Who would lead us Péngé?

MICHAEL DOM

In the temple of our democracy
The tome of our founding law
Has been torn asunder
And the desecraters
Elevated to demi-gods
For whom, upon corrupted altars,
Our children’s futures are surrendered.

But would we see our nation rise?
It is for us to become a sacrifice.

Who would lead us Péngé?
Would it be you my friend?

Go then to the temple
And hurl yourself upon the altar
A sacrifice for an unrepentant lot.

You who would lead us
What right is yours?
What glory?
What duty?
What destiny?
A privilege indeed
A blessed burden.

Two poems to mark the 2012 national elections

JEFFREY FEBI

National elections in the Eastern Highlands

Multitudes move, with songs in noise;
many without a mind, a few without a stomach;
and a leader is all they want, funny a need it isn’t;
and alone I journey on, amidst no daffodils nor flags;
and an injured inner eye and a heavy heart is all I posses;
then multitudes sing again, many without a mind, a few without a stomach;
no wrinkles of love nor hisses of storms, but with more songs and a growing want of a leader.

Election dilemma

Two months and a week
Weary journey to seek
True words that flowed
From a wellspring glowed
Intentions of noble kind
But now, did they mind?
Songs replace noble words
Noble words scurry down dark roads
Multitudes arrived without a brain
A few without a stomach is my gain
My favourite I’ll remain
Oh that’ll ever maintain

Justice for PNG lies in the ballot box

TODAY’S EDITORIAL IN THE
SYDNEY MORNING HERALD

THE STAND-OFF BETWEEN Papua New Guinea's parliament and its judiciary reached a dangerous flashpoint last week, which can only dismay the country's well-wishers in Australia.

The rights and wrongs of the legal and constitutional points involved are too arcane for all but a few specialists to grasp fully. What is clear is that both sides of the political contest at the bottom of it are resorting to force.

The action of the Deputy Prime Minister, Belden Namah, in storming into the Supreme Court at the head of a posse of police, to order the arrest of the chief justice, Salamo Injia, for sedition is outrageous. Namah is not the instrument of the law, nor are powers of prosecution on other laws such as sedition part of his ministerial responsibilities.

It was a snap, unilateral political arrest. The police, legal agencies and lower courts should have no bar of it but it appears they have. Five months ago Namah gave amnesty to some armed soldiers who had tried intervening in politics. Now he sees sedition in a private emails between two judges.

Similarly, some police associated with the officer appointed as police commissioner by the ousted prime minister Michael Somare made a disturbing intervention. They blocked access to the parliament on Friday to prevent Peter O'Neill, who replaced Somare in August, recalling MPs to reaffirm parliamentary support for his leadership. This is a contest between the law, as the highest court interprets it, and the parliament. The constitutional dilemma remains.

O'Neill convened parliament and retains its confidence, gaining extra emergency powers. The chief justice remains on the bench, despite government efforts to suspend him, and the court's ruling that the ousting of Somare was invalid also stands.

Fortunately, this parliament is in its last weeks, as elections are due next month - a resolution in practical terms. Debate will continue whether Salamo was right to push things on such fine points of parliamentary procedure, knowing political chaos could result, when the voters have an early chance to decide. The Supreme Court's important role against political misconduct now seems greatly weakened.

That PNG gets a fair and well-run election on schedule is supremely important. In its 37 years of independence from Australia, it has stuck to the constitutional schedule assiduously, despite many problems in holding elections in such difficult terrain.

Politics have been debased at times by bribery and intimidation but elections have delivered political change accepted by all.

O'Neill has headed off a push from within his ranks to delay the vote. He and his colleagues must now apply all possible resources to ensure an honest, transparent election.

The next parliament will present a tremendous opportunity for PNG's 7 million people. The ExxonMobil liquefied natural gas project centred on the southern highlands will start deliveries to foreign customers in 2014. In its first year, it will boost gross domestic product by 20 to 25 per cent. Already, development work has given PNG the seventh highest growth rate in the world. The revenue streams will mightily boost the government's resources.

But much of the population still lives a subsistence lifestyle, growing and catching food, barely touching the modern economy except in the odd cash sale. How to connect that LNG revenue and other resources from tax-paying activity with that subsistence village world is the job of the government.

It means steady painstaking work in extending roads and boat jetties, harnessing communication leaps such as the spread of mobile telephones, improving security on roads and in market places, and building human capacity through schooling, health services and adult education.

We can only hope the next parliament focuses more on these policies and less on squabbling over the spoils of office.

A villanelle for the people of Paga Hill

BY PETER KRANZ

My tambus gone away,
The hut is lost and chill,
There is nothing more to say.

Through broken house and way
The winds blow bleak and shrill.
Tambus forced away.

Nor is there friend today
To speak them gud or ill:
There is nothing more to say.

Why is it we are then waylaid
Around the smashed-up shell?
They all are gone away,

And our poor wantok-way
For them is giaman still:
There is nothing more to say.

There is ruin and decay
In our House upon the Hill:
They all are gone away,
There is nothing more to say.

Rosaline and Roven import some PNG magic

BY KEITH JACKSON

 

WHEN DUBBO DAVE KESBY, who died last week, had to give away driving his cab because of ill health, he put his time into forming and playing with the Hornsby Berowra Ukulele Group (otherwise known as Hornsby BUGs) in Sydney’s north.

The 24-strong group played at Dave’s memorial service last Wednesday and now has been joined by two new Papua New Guinean residents of Berowra, Rosaline and Roven, who had their initial outing with BUGS at the Berowra Pub last Friday.

I think you’ll find their performance (which is now on YouTube) as exhilarating and joyful as the live audience did.

Thanks to Elissa Kesby for the tip-off. “They wanted to sing a traditional song and they seem quite at home with the ukuleles,” Elissa says. “I thought it was quite nice that this connection with Dave, unwittingly, happened.”

Me too. Because BUGS is part of Dave's legacy now. And I love the chocolate moment at the end of the clip....

Capturing the desiderata: painting a political star

BY JEFFRY FEEGER
FACEBOOK

WHILE I WAS DOWN IN SYDNEY, Papua New Guinea's very own deputy prime minister Belden Namah created a media frenzy; appearing on front pages of Australian newspapers with allegations made against him of sexual harassment, heavy intoxication and gross spending at Sydney’s Star casino.

So on Friday 16 March, the day before I left Sydney I decided to paint live in public outside the Opera House and portray our deputy PM in a more dignified, respectful manner, showing the kind of leader we wish we could have representing our country.

PNG's very own talented graphic artist Samson Korawali and renowned journalist Alexander Rheeney were also on hand to document every moment. Together we were able to muster a small crowd of wantoks and engage conversation with passers by.

This kind of impromptu performance and collaboration is what we believe to be the result of a significant paradigm shift in the expression of human beings, being spurred on by rapid changes in media technology and the social media revolution now sweeping Papua New Guinea and the world.

We hope that new forms of self expression through art and media can become powerful tools to guide, influence and inspire young people for positive change towards greater sense of self, identity and empowerment.

Photograph by Samson Korowali

See also: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150681037963913.414612.53939103912&type=3&l=5cd049542d

Twelve haiku for Stan Jackson OAM

BY MICHAEL THEOPHILUS DOM

battle fields divide,
ranks of men throw down their lives…
they will rise as one

in the aftermath
of war and through life’s changes –
hope for a new day

across the oceans
to a desert continent;
to build a new home

we have not heard tales
of the woman beside him;
from his we know hers

from one death, rebirth;
many new paths for a soul
to seek his own truth

rivers  flow apart;
in the salted ocean
they will meet again

high in the mountains
an old man leads a tour group…
on a bicycle!

a few broken ribs:
India is amazing,
as they say he was

a tale he told once;
he slept in a rice paddy
somewhere in Japan

once as enemies
they met across battle lines –
then he wrote them books

a great man we say,
but he was a good father
even before that

I know Keith Jackson
and that is now as good as
knowing Stan Jackson.

A poetic farewell to this Valentine's Day 2012

AS THE SUN SETS over Santiago, Chile, perhaps the last great city in the world to still be in St Valentine's Day, I can report that San Valentino is richly acknowledged here - hawkers bearing bunches of long-stem flowers, senorinas in full traditional garb - and a final poem from Papua New Guinea poet JIMMY DREKORE to skim around the globe....

Happy Valentine’s Day

If I am lost in the universe
I’ll write your name among the stars
You can see it every night
So you can remember
I love you to the ends of the universe

If I am lost on an island
I’ll write your name on the sand
The waves will carry it to the ocean
So you can remember
I love you to the depths of the ocean

If I am lost in a jungle
I’ll write your name on a vine
it will climb to the top
So you can remember
I love you to the heavens above

If I’m washed away in a river
I’ll write on your name on a pebble
It’ll find its way to the banks
So you can remember
I love you to the edge of the sphere

To the ends of the universe - see how wide is my love
To the depths of the ocean - see how deep is my love
To the heavens above - see how straight is my love
To the edge of the sphere - see how complete is my love

I shall love you from dawn to noon and hold you close to my heart
We shall leave all the pain and sorrow behind us
Embrace each other and look out into the ocean
Let our love sail far and beyond the horizon
For time is not our choice
If I’m given one wish
I wish you were right beside me
So I can whisper to you

Happy Valentine’s Day

I was torn

BY JIMMY DREKORE

DEDICATED to the missing children of the sinking ferry.  Spend valuable time with your children and appreciate their little moments.  You never know if they may not be with you the next moment....

He woke me up
I got up

I carried him to the side
For a little ride

On my shoulder
No monster would bother

He slept again
I had to maintain

Under the southern skies
Stars smiled with glittering eyes

I listened to his breathing
He was communicating

Once or twice he smiled
And they smiled

I tried to see who
It was all blue

When I opened my eye
I see the sky

His last rest
was on my chest

I felt the emptiness
like the wilderness

the bitter cold
no one could hold

No more to tell
Only tears fell

My little Tonton
was gone

I was torn

Jimmy Drekore won the Crocodile Prize for Poetry in 2011.  He is president of the Simbu Children Foundation

Rabaul Queen may have carried over 700 passengers

BY PNGEXPOSED

MORE THAN 300 PASSENGERS are believed to have perished in the disastrous sinking of the Rabaul Queen during the early hours of Thursday last week, reports the Post Courier.

Reports reaching the newspaper have said the vessel was overloaded, allegedly carrying more than 700 passengers: 400 when it left Buka, more than 100 in Rabaul, and about 360 in Kavieng and Kimbe.

This is much more than the 350 that had been quoted in the media.

Chief Executive Officer of National Maritime and Safety Authority (NMSA), Captain Nurur Rahman, had indicated the ship was overloaded adding that its certificate allowed for only 310 passengers.

Rabaul Shipping initially advised there were 350 passengers and 12 crew members on board but survivors are now testifying that there were hundreds more on board that fateful voyage.

NMSA has also advised the total number of passengers is sketchy because there was no proper manifest from Buka, Rabaul and Kimbe as many passengers bought their tickets at the wharf.

Many survivors have confirmed this information and have questioned media reports that there were 350 passengers’ destined for Lae when the ship sank.

A story published on Facebook by a relative of a survivor says: ““From my younger brother, who was on board MV Rabaul Queen when disaster struck. ‘There were actually 780 passengers on board - 420 from Rabaul/Kavieng /Buka and 360 from Kimbe. Mostly young children, mothers and students. There weren’t any emergency procedures or demonstrations when they got on the ship and the shipping agency didn’t limit passenger intakes’.”

Using drama to end violence against women

UN WOMEN

‘DRAMATISING VIOLENCE.’ That’s the motto of the community-based Seeds Theatre Group which is addressing violence against women and girls in the densely populated communities around Lae.

The group consists primarily of unemployed youth and uses theatre as a tool to raise awareness in urban communities with high risks of HIV/AIDS, crime and drugs.

It held 42 performances in January in public areas, including at markets, bus stops and public neighbourhoods.

How does the audience react to the performances? “Some feel guilty, others are concerned, and most women learn that there is help out there to protect their basic human rights,” said Willie Doaemo, technical director of the group.

“Many men who didn’t realise violence against women was a crime punishable by law have spoken up and promised to stop beating their wives,” he added.

On the other hand, the artists themselves have gone through a learning process by reading the scripts and performing.

“Women are seen as inferior in our society, and this thinking has been passed on from generation to generation,” said Teddy Iwara, one of the actors. “Through the gender training, the rehearsals and the awareness performances, I am starting to respect and collaborate with my mother and sisters in our home.”

Mr Doaemo expects to reach almost 70% of the population in the Lae District through a total of 168 performances over four months, although the group faces challenging circumstances.

Lae was declared a conflict zone last November when ten people were killed, public gatherings were restricted, and people were afraid to leave their homes. But the group improvises to get the public’s attention: “We played loud music to bring the crowd out anyway,” Mr. Doaemo laughed.

The Seeds Theatre Group was established in 1997 by Sam Solomon Sommi, a theatre professional and trainer who saw the artistic talent of youth in the Lae settlements and started to provide training in drama, dance and music.

By using traditional performing arts as a strategy for education, the Seeds Theatre Group utilises the potential of young unemployed women and men, and at the same time raises awareness on the causes and consequences of domestic violence, sexual harassment in the workplace and bullying in schools.

Might is Right!

BY GANJIKI D WAYNE

Might is Right!
Look at us, Just look!!
Whatever has become of us!?
What darkness has come over this home of ours?
...

East Sepik artists create their work in Brisbane

AUSTRALIAN HIGH COMMISSION

THREE ARTISTS FROM Abelam and seven from Kwoma in the East Sepik have travelled to Brisbane to create new work based on the art found in ceremonial men’s houses in the province.

Last year, Ruth McDougall, Curator of Pacific Art, and Michael O’Sullivan, Exhibitions Manager, from the Queensland Art Gallery travelled to the East Sepik with Papua New Guinea-born architect Martin Fowler to research the ceremonial men’s houses created by Abelam and Kwoma artists.

This research forms part of the development of a major project at the Gallery which explores ideas of the ‘ephemeral’ in contemporary art created in PNG.

Along with the mask cultures of New Britain and the contemporary art of Asmat artists in Papua, the East Sepik structures were chosen because of their powerful visual impact, the continuing strength of kastom and the structures’ ephemeral nature.

McDougall, O’Sullivan and Fowler visited villages in the areas surrounding Maprik and travelled up the Sepik River to Tongwinjamb, Mino and Yessan to view men’s houses and meet with artists and community leaders.

During this travel, groups of Kwoma, Abelam and Arapesh artists also participated in an art workshop based at the Ilahita guesthouse, with materials supplied by the Queensland Art Gallery.

As a result of these visits, two projects were identified as major commissions for the Gallery of Modern Art in Brisbane as part of the Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art exhibition.

For nine of the ten artists, this project represents their first opportunity for international travel.  They will live in Brisbane for six to eight weeks and will have a dedicated workshop for carving and painting.

Life-after-death sculptures fascinate Pacific academic

BY EILEEN GOODWIN
Otago Daily Times

TO UNDERSTAND PACIFIC ART it is necessary to discard Western assumptions, curator Dr Michael Gunn says.

Dr Gunn, senior curator of Pacific Art at the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra, has returned to his hometown of Dunedin to spend a fortnight at Otago Museum.

He is examining and helping improve documentation of the museum's collection of Malagan art from New Ireland. The museum has more than 300 pieces of Malagan art.

Malagan art is known for ritual sculptures which illustrate a person's life after their death. Dr Gunn said the death sculpture concept was hard for Westerners to understand.

On several trips to the islands between the early 1980s and 2001, he sought to immerse himself in the culture.

His experiences shook up his beliefs, including those relating to the concepts of magic and sorcery, which were part of local culture.

"There is a lot we do not know ..."

Important cultural practices were very much alive when he first arrived. However, in recent years, life on the islands had changed, partly because of mining.

After a lengthy commemoration of the person's life, the ritual sculptures were destroyed, although sometimes they were sold to foreigners, which for the islanders was akin to destroying them.

The sculptures depicted the person's life force, and various aspects of their life.

Dr Gunn is impressed with one of Otago museum's sculptures' which dates from 1860-70.

The museum's collection also includes Malagan masks, mainly worn by young men and used in dramatic rituals.

The masks depict emotions and character in ways unknown in Western art and have a visual vocabulary which is unique, Dr Gunn said.

Aaron Choulai’s modern Motuan art music

BY TONY HILLIER

UNIQUE IS AN OFT-MISUSED ADJECTIVE in this modern world, but in the case of the musical collaboration involving piano prodigy and composer Aaron Choulai [pictured], a Papua New Guinean choir from his ancestral village, some of Australia’s hottest young jazz soloists and visual elements, the word is truly applicable.

Choulai’s background is as exotic and intriguing as the project that he leads. The albino son of a Chinese/Motuan mother and Jewish/Polish/Australian father, he has plied his trade as an international jazzman of repute from Melbourne, New York and, currently, Tokyo over the past decade.

We Don’t Dance For No Reason [Ai Na Asi A Mavaru Kavamu] brings together the various cultural strands of his life, primarily the stunning Peroveta Anedia (prophet songs) vocal tradition that is part of his heritage.

“Everyone from the Papuan coastal regions and Motuan villages knows these songs,” he says, “although each village has their own interpretation.”

Polynesian missionaries brought with them choral music that bridged bible stories and traditional tribal music.

Working with the mixed gender Tatana Village Choir from his island birthplace near Port Moresby has afforded Choulai a much-appreciated chance to reconnect with a heritage that’s far removed from his lifestyle playing jazz in some of the world’s biggest cities.

“What I do professionally has nothing to do with who I feel I am culturally, so I felt like I had to keep putting on these different hats.” With We Don’t Dance For No Reason he has been able to combine the contrasting realms.

The plan for his unique multicultural, multimedia enterprise was hatched after a conversation with then piano teacher, mentor and now close friend Paul Grabowsky, one of Australia’s most respected jazzmen, when Choulai was still in his teens.

“I played him a tape of the choral music from PNG, and he seemed to be excited about it. A few years later, as the artistic director of the Queensland Music Festival, we talked about it again and with his guidance, we came up with the skeleton for the show.”

Invited to describe his hybrid in a nutshell, Choulai says: “It’s new music … modern Papuan art music, modern jazz … whatever you’d like to call it.”

He expands: “The musicians improvise solos based around harmonic structures and form, and sometimes are also required to improvise freely. The intent behind the music is to move forward, to find something new as musicians.”

The videos that accompany We Don’t Dance For No Reason, he says, provide a window into Motuan life.

“You get a brief history of Papua, insights into Motuan culture and some understanding of the social and political situation in PNG at the moment. But most importantly, hearing the choir, I’m sure audiences see how important the role of music is in Motuan societies and the pure joy it brings to the Motuans.”

When he started to compose the music, Choulai’s guiding principle was that if he stayed honest to what he was hearing it would naturally all fall into place. While he admits communication wasn’t always easy, he concedes he has been surprised in terms of how the villagers have taken to the idea of ‘art’.

“You have to understand that developing tradition, or pushing the boundaries of culture, does not come naturally to Motuans. I think before the village had a chance to hear the piece, people were a little suspicious of the project, but we did a large concert for everyone a few years ago at the arts theatre in Port Moresby, and since then, people seem to be understanding what I am trying to do, and generally support me.”

Source: World Music Central.  The interview first appeared in Rhythms, Australia’s only dedicated roots music magazine, for which the author is World/Folk correspondent

Bagpipes, bloody fools and PNG's first opera

BY DAVID URQUHART-JONES

I SPENT SIX YEARS in what was then ‘the Territory’, during which time I founded a choir, an orchestra, and the Port Moresby Junior Music School, which served both the indigenous and expatriate communities.

The choir and orchestra performed major choral works and, on one occasion, flew to Madang and performed Messiah in an old aircraft hangar. Jim Griffin, the noted academic whose obituary has appeared in PNG Attitude, was the tenor soloist.

The music school, supported by Director of Education Ken McKinnon and the Administrator's wife, Dulcie Johnston, provided a complete program of studies every Saturday morning. One of the children attending is now principal cellist with the Tasmanian Symphony orchestra.

The Port Moresby orchestra, augmented by musicians from the RPNGC (Police) Band accompanied the first performance of an opera in PNG - HMS Pinafore. Both cast and orchestra included local and expatriate members. 

We hired two DC3 aircraft to transport choir and orchestra to Madang, where we were to perform Messiah, and, on the night of arrival, a chamber concert. 

 

Unfortunately some of our baggage, including formal dress for the performances, was offloaded at Lae, and we had to make do with borrowed shirts and socks.  The decision to do the whole formal bit with black tie and black dresses had been resisted by Jim Griffin who, as it turned out, did not know that the arrival of most of the formal gear had been delayed.

   

He turned up dutifully for the chamber concert in a hunting pink evening jacket - the only one he could find. Seeing our motley attire, he thought we had played a trick on him and was furious.  Being a very good natured bloke, however, he turned on a fine performance for that concert and for Messiah the next day.  Jim was a fine musician and went on to participate in many of our concerts.

 

The district commissioner had earlier sent a LandRover round the district announcing that the bigpela singsing, the Messiah, was coming. It turned out to be a superb promotional wheeze. Thousand of locals trekked in from the bush relieved to find that, at last, Jesus had arrived.  What a wonderful audience they turned out to be.

  

The police band had been trained by Inspector Tom Shacklady to very high levels of musical performance.  Tom could never stop swearing (Tourette's syndrome) and did so freely, no matter how august the company.  He gave me some help and a book on principles of brass instrument performance.

 

My first year was spent at Sogeri High School, where there was a cadet unit.  The house to which I was assigned had been an army hospital during World War II and the army had left behind some brass instruments. I used Tom's book to instruct a number of students in the art of getting musical sounds from cornets, trumpets, a flügel horn, a small bore trombone and an E flat tuba. 

 

Within less that a year they were playing at football matches in Moresby.  I was a wind player myself but being an expert on the bagpipes was not much help in getting a brass band together. 

  

Bagpipes were very popular among the locals. I remember when I first played them on the Oval at Sogeri.  Boys jumped over walls and rushed to find out what the noise was about.  Then they fell in behind me as I marched, like the pied piper, around the Oval. The boys were soon joined by girls from the local village who shrieked with pleasure as they joined the marchers. 

 

On another occasion I was playing my pipes at a singsing in a village near Moresby when a painted warrior thrust his face into mine saying 'Booti-ful, booti-ful'. I thought he was saying 'bloody fool' and stopped playing.  However he was actually saying 'beautiful', so I started again and he pranced along in my wake.

  

Another unforgettable moment occurred  during the performance of Pinafore. One of the songs has the words '...for he is an Englishman'.  The eyes of my student singer, Jonbili Tokome, from Buka, sparkled with mirth as he joined gleefully in the chorus. At the end of the first performance the Administrator, who was in attendance, got up and made a speech in which he noted the first performance of an opera in PNG.

 

A concert tour with the Australian violinist, Ronald Woodcock, was also not without its adventures.  We performed in the golf club in Lae.  The bar at the far end of our concert room remained open during the performance and a  lighting man from the local dramatic society assisted by shining a spotlight in our faces. 

 

Realising that we looked worried, he then turned on a fan which blew the music of the stands.  We managed - including the copious number of SP stubbies we were offered afterwards.

  

I am greatly indebted to my patrons Dulcie Johnson and Ken McKinnon, as well as to the many fine musicians who gave their time freely and generously to providing instruction and performances in the projects that I fostered during the six years I was privileged to serve in PNG.

 

David Urquhart-Jones, who now lives in Victoria, has played double bass in England; conducted orchestral concerts in the United States; played jazz piano on a river boat; and performed internationally as an accompanist and in chamber ensembles. He is now distilling his experiences in compositions which reflect his many faceted musical career.

In his own words: Ulli Beier’s writing classes

SELECTED BY PHIL FITZPATRICK

This is an extract from ULLI BEIER's memoir of Papua New Guinea, ‘Decolonising the Mind’, published by the now defunct Pandanus Books at the Australian National University. Ulli Beier passed away on 3 April 2011, aged 88 - PF

THE CREATIVE WRITING CLASS attracted some of the brightest and certainly the most politically conscious students.

They were not literati; they were not discussing style and form.  They were disinterested in literary trends and fashions.  They used literature as a tool.

They were aware that they were the first generation of Papuans and New Guineans who could talk back at the white man.  Ever since the Germans, the British and later the Australians had ruled the country, they were expected to take orders and obey them.

They had never been credited with the intelligence to form an opinion of their own.  They were considered uneducable by most early administrators and missionaries, and it needed a courageous man of strong convictions like the Rev Charles Abel even to insist that Papuans could be trained as carpenters!

Now, there was a group of young men and women who sympathised with the aspirations of PANGU Pati, who were trying to define themselves as Papuans and New Guineans and who were anxious to interpret their own history and their own culture in their own terms, rather than have it interpreted – and often denigrated – for them by white people.

Their motivation was not too dissimilar from that of the African négritude writers of the forties and fifties, but they were less romantic and more down to earth than their Francophone colleagues.

They were all very idealistic – at least in those early days.  John Waiko refrained from taking a lucrative job in Port Moresby after completing his MA degree in Canada and spent two years in his Binandere village instead, in order to persuade his people not to sell their forest.

John Kasaipwalova broke off his studies at the university in order to form the Kabisawali movement in the Trobriand Islands.*

Arthur Jawodimbari went to Nigeria to study drama at the University of Ife, so he could develop professional theatre in Papua New Guinea.  Rabbie Namaliu and Leo Hannet became vocal supporters of the independence movement.

With the exception of Russell Soaba none of them made a career as a writer, but all of them made distinguished careers in a great variety of fields: Leo Hannet became Premier of Bougainville, Rabbie Namiliu became Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea, Jacob Simet became the Chairman of the National Cultural Commission, John Waiko became the first indigenous professor at the University of Papua New Guinea, Arthur Jawodimbari became the Director of the National Theatre Company, John Kadiba became a lecturer in an Aboriginal college in Darwin.

Kumalau Tawali got sidetracked into Moral Rearmament, John Saunana became a Cabinet Minister in the Solomon Islands, Russell Soaba a lecturer in English at UPNG. Kaka Kais played a leading political role on Manus Island.

Their venture into creative writing made all of them more aware of their culture; it helped them to acquire a strong sense of identity and a vision for the future of Papua New Guinea….

The political and economic developments in Papua New Guinea, the sense of disillusionment and a general feeling of helplessness have crushed some of this enthusiasm and idealism in recent years.  In Papua New Guinea now, life has often become an issue of mere survival and, as a result, a sober pragmatism has now replaced their earlier hopes.

* Kabisawali was a political/cultural movement that tried to replace the local government structure introduced by the Australian administration.  John Kasaipwalova persuaded the people of the Kabisawali movement to plant surplus yam again so that they could revive the traditional feasts and dances.  The young carver Valaosi created an innovative series of relief panels which illustrated the history of the movement.

Introducing the Pangalia happiness sound

  

WHAT IS THE PNG-AUSTRALIA (let us name it ‘Pangalia’) sound in popular music?  Well, if you listen to the Canberra-based RaMaPops, featured in this video, it’s all of bouncy, cheerful and happiness-inducing.

RaMaPops’ members are a polyglot lot - hailing from Rabaul, Manus and Popondetta (hence RaMaPops, geddit?) and they all live in Australia where they have developed their distinctive Pangalian style of ‘we shall not be worried’ music.

Their latest album, a single from which you can sample above, is Ol Mangi Ples....The Group.

RaMaPops say they are interested in promoting PNG music and culture in Australia and abroad and the album is currently on iTunes, emuzic, and amazon music if you are interested in having your own copy.

Spotter: Peter Kranz

Collecting traditional songs in the Sepik

BY BARBARA (NEASMITH) SHORT

ONE SATURDAY IN 1971 I asked the school girls at Brandi High School to come to my house to record their local village songs on my small reel-to-reel tape recorder.

I was amazed at the variety of short songs and at the unusual tones they created with their voices.

There were sad songs to sing when people died, happy little work songs, fishing songs, gardening songs, and songs to remember historic events.

Most of the songs were repeated over and over again and some had a little dance associated with them.

Often the beat was not constant, so it was hard to accompany them on a guitar.

I sometimes heard local PNG bands on the radio that had taken local tunes and set them to a regular rhythm so they could be used for western style dancing.

One example was the song Bara Gita from Dagua, about a woman who is very sad whilst in Morobe. It became a very popular string band piece when set to a regular beat!

Bara Gita una (3 times)
Una gani Morobe (3 times)
Una uti angela (3 times)
Kwape Kunei wari (3 times)
Kunei wari moyo (once!)

There were a number of other songs the girls sang for me that I really liked and I learned to sing them correctly and with the right rhythms and tone of voice.

One was called Ei Yakli Nani Aluman and was a song of mourning and had to be enunciated with a really sad tone in the voice. Another was a delightful fishing song from the Murik Lakes near the mouth of the Sepik.

I proceeded to teach the songs I had collected to my music classes, whose students came from a large number of Sepik villages.

One year I took a group to the Murik Lakes area during the holidays. The children wandered off to explore while I cooked tea. Suddenly one child came racing back to me calling out, “I heard it, I heard it!”

“What did you hear?” I said.

“The song you taught us. They are down there by the lake fishing and they are singing that song you taught us!”

I remember thinking that this made it all worthwhile. I was also glad that I had evidently taught it correctly!

I felt it was good that the students were learning songs from other villages. Later I found out that, if you wanted to perform a song or singsing that belonged to someone else, you would usually have to pay a bag of rice or some other present as a kind of royalty payment. But I felt it was good that village people could share their songs with people from other villages.

I wonder if PNG is still alive with traditional music and are the village folk still singing their folk songs. I hope so.

Hal Holman plans exhibition for the Gold Coast

BY KEITH JACKSON

A FEW MONTHS BACK, feeling the weight of his near 90 years, the prolific sculptor and painter, Hal Holman OL OAM, moved to the Gold Coast in Queensland to be nearer family.

Hal, whose imagery of Papua New Guinea now extends for half a century and who has been honoured by the governments of both PNG and Australia, has experienced some health problems since making his move to the town of Helensvale.

But he’s now back in harness – “I have remained industrious,” as Hal puts it - and is planning a major exhibition of 40 paintings and six bronze sculptures for 9-11 December.

The subject matter of these objet d’art is diverse, but – as you might imagine – there will be a good sprinkling of Papua New Guinea subjects on show.

The venue for the exhibition is the community hall at 5 Mildura Drive, Helensvale, not far from Mermaid Beach where Hal's much remarked mermaid sculpture, completed last year, now stands.

Hal is particularly keen for people who have spent time in PNG, or who are interested in the country, to visit the exhibition and make his acquaintance.

So if you live in south east Queensland here’s a great opportunity to hook up with a living legend.

Let’s leverage mining companies to support the arts

BY JOHN PASQUARELLI

THE PIECE by Julius Violaris, Can the national museum survive the politics [PNG Attitude, 15 October], comes as no surprise.

As a past donor to the museum before independence, I had my reservations about what direction Papua New Guinea would take after 1975 and sadly – cynic that I am – I have been basically proved correct.

Reading blogs and the PNG print media confirms that the majority of Papua New Guineans have been, for a long time, deeply concerned as to where their country is heading, be it in politics, mining, health, law and order or - in this case – their culture.

I am considered by some to be an expert on Oceanic art, with that of the Sepik being my speciality, and I have dealt with many prestigious organisations including Basel, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the French National Museum and many of the greats including Professor Jean Paul Guiart, Professor Buhler and many reputable and dedicated private collectors.

I had dealings with Nelson Rockefeller through his curator Douglas Newton who became a good friend of mine when he first came to the Sepik in the early 1960s.

Long before Julius Violaris came along, rumours abounded about serious rorting at the Museum but the obvious dysfunction existing at all levels of PNG government made prosecution impossible.

Julius Violaris’ statement that “quite obviously both artefacts and money were being continuously stolen” negates what he later says about “unscrupulous and money-hungry individuals”.

Just imagine if those treasures that are now safely held by overseas institutions and individuals had all ended up in the PNG Museum. The rorting and theft would have reached huge proportions and the purchasers of such stolen treasure could never afford to reveal its location.

A solution to the concerns raised by Julius Violaris exists and it is linked to the second great wave of PNG mining development, which, if properly and sensibly administered, gives new generations of Papua New Guineans the chance to rectify many past mistakes.

With mining companies being encouraged to participate, and supported by good government, the PNG Museum could be re-established as a properly monitored repository of the country’s cultural history.

But the assistance of overseas experts such as curators would be required along with the all-important infrastructure such as air-conditioning and restoration services.

The administration of the Museum must be impeccably reorganised with an urgent audit being the first priority – just what still remains at the museum and its condition.

An office fire in Melbourne destroyed many of my records but I still have some PNG Museum donor acknowledgement cards and a visit would jog my memory as to what remains of those Sepik pieces I donated.

I still have unfinished business in PNG concerning the Frieda River copper and gold prospect which I discovered in 1963 – on the day JFK was shot - and if Xstrata Copper begins mining I will be encouraging it to positively participate in the sponsoring and perpetuation of Sepik art.

But back to the concerns of Julius Violaris.

A reborn PNG Museum would be able to attract exhibitions on loan of PNG artefacts from overseas institutions and collectors, thus allowing Papua New Guineans to come and see for themselves the art of their ancestors.

As in other countries, a reputable PNG Museum would attract gifts and bequests and the job of rebuilding its inventory could begin.

Moresby girl’s music is taking the US by storm

PAPUA NEW GUINEA born and raised Aussie singer Megan Washington is taking the US by storm. She sings and plays piano and guitar.

Washington was born in Port Moresby where she lived until 1997 when the family moved to Brisbane, where she spent her teenage years, and attended Moreton Bay College.

After that, she also attended Sheldon College, where she discovered her talent for music. She is currently based in Melbourne. She studied jazz voice at the Queensland Conservatorium of Music and released Nightlight, an EP with jazz pianist Sean Foran in 2006, and then an EP Bennetts Lane with pianist Paul Grabowsky in 2007.

Washington's stellar 2010 - during which her album rose to No. 3 in Australia, went platinum and culminated with her ARIA wins - was just reward after years of toil, but the whirlwind of promotion and performance took a toll when she found herself in hospital with pneumonia last December.

That, along with her difficulties sleeping, provided fuel for what she calls "a work in four acts" that was an attempt to make sense of the intense year that followed the release of I Believe You Liar.

"I had incredibly bad luck for the first six months of this year," she says. "I had pneumonia twice and a lot of medical things went wrong. I couldn't sleep and I was very unwell and I spent a lot of time at night writing songs."

Washington readily concedes the condition seriously messes with her head at times.

"Some days I wake up and feel like I've been dreaming for about three months," she says. "I don't remember what I've done or where I've been ... I don't think I'm going nuts but it has certainly been a very strange, foggy time - but all this music came out of it."

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/entertainment/insider/washington-takes-on-america/story-e6frewt9-1226165929424

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BC5Z6-_yIuo&feature=fvst

Spotter: Peter Kranz

Exhibition: Aroaoa - the story of a people

BY JEFFRY FEEGER

EARLY THIS YEAR, Ratoos Haopa and I made the journey to visit his tribe, the Aroaro people of the Ihu District, Gulf Province.

A people of rich ancestral knowledge and story telling history of which Ratoos illustrates through his every painting.

Located along the Vailala river the village of Maelava became our home for a week, before we traveled down to the coast.

During our stay, we participated in community meetings and talked to people to hear their concerns. In some way we wanted to try to address them in our capacity as contemporary artists by bringing about attention to issues they face.

People were quite upset with the logging being done in the area by company Rimbunan Hijau (RH).

After several failed attempts at bringing RH to court the villagers still do not fairly benefit from the logging happening in the area, sadly they are reminded everyday of this when they see the barges with stacked logs floating down their river.

There was confusing information being disseminated by local level government as too what InterOil's interest were in developing the area and it left people feeling both fearful, anxious and excited as to what the future would bring.

The story of the Aroaro people is the story of rural PNG, the story of our land, it's resources and what it might mean for us and our future.

Reproductions: My Future by Jeffry Feeger; Paga Corals by Ratoos Haoapa Gary

Joint exhibition by Jeffry Feeger and Ratoos Haoapa Gary.  To 20 August.  Gallery: Steamships Hardware Compound, Waigani.  Saturday 9am-12 noon or after 11am Tuesday to Friday

Those elaborate sung highlands tales

BY ALEX GOLUB

MOST OF US who have a connection with the Australian anthropological scene are familiar with the Australian National University’s E-Press.

The press publishes open access, full-length, fully edited and peer reviewed works which are available in paper, HTML, for mobile, PDF, the whole lot.

As someone who’s published with them before I’ve been impressed with their professionalism, and as someone who works on topics frequently addressed by the Press’s authors, I’m impressed by the quality of the content they produce.

This month, the press helped solidify its reputation as an important scholarly publisher by releasing Sung Tales from the Papua New Guinea Highlands, edited by Alan Rumsey and Don Niles. This volume is a great example of how to do open access, and do it right.

Anyone who has spent any time in the highlands of PNG will have heard (or heard of) these lengthy, beautiful, and exceptionally elaborate chanted tales — they are a hallmark of the region and the people who specialise in performing them are well-known and admired for their abilities.

We are talking like Iliad type tales here people: genuine epic poetry. And yet somehow they have never really achieved the attention that they deserve from researchers — I know that when Alan Rumsey asked me about sung tales in Porgera I was like: “uh yeah… they do that… it’s cool… uh.”

This book aims to fix all that by documenting and exploring this genre of performance. The story of how the thing got put together is pretty epic: a research project that took about a decade; interdisciplinary collaboration between anthropologists, linguists, and ethnomusicologists; the work of academics from around the world, Papua New Guinean bards, and Papua New Guinean academics.

This is nothing if not collaborative ethnography. The result is a book that covers an area of hundreds of miles, a gaggle of language and ethnic groups, and includes a collection of tightly integrated texts.

The best thing about the volume is not just that it is free for download, but that the ANU E-Press’s website includes mp3s of these tales themselves . Check out, for instance, these brief recordings of bits of Melpa and Ipili sung speech.

The site also includes a brief video of a man singing as well as transcripts of an interview that exists in somewhat edited form in the book itself.

Anthropologists are often excited by ‘multimedia’ possibilities presented by ‘cyberspace’ but most experiments with multimedia come off as ungrounded in a solid research question or the needs of the argument — often they just appear included because multimedia is ‘the future’ (at least this is how people talked in the 90s).

Here, in contrast, the open access online format enables the editors and authors to make the recordings an essential part of the book — and of course, to make them available to Papua New Guineans themselves, free of charge, as long as they have an internet connection.

Source: Savage Minds.  Alex Golub is an assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. He studies mining and petroleum development in Papua New Guinea, as well as American culture

Emptying their frustrations on the shores

BY JEFFREY MANE FEBI

HEADLINES BOMBARD our eyes one after the other and there seems no end to it.

Senior public servants and politicians, their cohorts a step behind in dark shadows, continue to milk the country using any means possible.

They plan in comfort and style and execute while dying mothers and their helpless children are crying out to be saved from treatable ailments. Even fathers who work hard to protect and feed their wife and children are found wanting.

Old and young alike have one thing in common: a cry that resonates from their wretched hearts and it continues day and night. In times of happiness and sadness their cry crashes on idle ears-ears that listen but can’t hear.

Elders did it before and the wrinkles of their struggles scar their faces. But when their children begin, elders join and together fight to make this cry be heard.

In this ocean of corruption, men, women and children struggle to stay afloat. Like the waves that try to escape the deep and vast ocean only to crash at the shores and return to the ocean, no matter how long we cry, there is no escaping from it.

Following is a poetic version of what you’ve just read.

I watched on the shore.

I watched as they rushed, one after
the other to the shore as if to
escape from a prison deep and vast.
Breaking their anger and emptying
their frustrations in loud confusions.

Their frustrations of continuous
imprisonment in this vicious
cycle day and night.

Those who journeyed before, encouraged
by new wind journey again and again
on tired crests and troughs.

To together break their anger and
empty their frustrations.

What manner of respite would redeem
them from this stranglehold of the
ocean so deep and vast.

Not even the calmest of breeze
caressing the ocean's surface nor a
beautiful clear blue sky is appeasing.

To escape from deep and vast ocean
will take forever which none have.

And they continue day and night to
break their anger and empty their
frustrations on the shores where
idle and hardened rocks watch.

When will this wickedness end? This question can be best answered by each and every one. When each one takes a committed step, we will witness a decline in corruption. So are you ready to take a committed step?

You can read more of Jeffrey’s poetry at http://jefebi-whispers.blogspot.com and http://febijefwhispers.wordpress.com.

The lost Melanesians

BY MARTYN NAMORONG

YOU have a name for folks like me
Coconuts!
Black on the outside and white inside
Yeah sure I know my people
And maybe I speak their language
But I am not one of them

YOU TOK mi Mangi Mosbi
Boi bilong bikpela siti
Na yu tokim mi olsem
Paps blo yu lusim peles longtaim
So nau yu nogat giraun

Shameful! aint it?
Yeah mate its bloody shameful!
And I cover up my shame
By calling YOU ples tingting
Nogat save bilong yu
YOU’re hurt and I’m hurting

Siti boi ino save lo bunara
Na peles mangi ino save lo laptop
Teach me to be me
But do not be like me
I admire you mangi blo ples
YOU are my missing ME

I’m just a cargo boi to Kongkongs
Na yu em papa bilong graun
Het bilong mi go longlong
Na mi salim graun bilong yu
Yeah I sold it for 99 years bro
Sold my soul and sold you off

Classical music inspired by PNG’s people

BY PETER KRANZ

 

YOU DON'T OFTEN come across classical music directly inspired by Papua New Guinea.  But one notable exception is the US composer Christopher Roberts.

Several of his works have been directly inspired by the time he spent living a village life in the Star Mountains, and they have been performed by major orchestras in the US and Europe.

Christopher Roberts is a composer and double bassist, an idiosyncratic solo improviser on the bass and other instruments, who is comfortable within the Western classical, jazz, and folk traditions and in Pacific Rim musical traditions.

He grew up in Southern California (where his first bass was the prop bass replete with bullet holes from the Billy Wilder movie Some Like It Hot), but has spent much of his life since the early 1980s overseas.

Only fairly recently did he return to the US, where he currently teaches music at Whatcom Community College in Bellingham, Washington. He studied composition with Vincent Persichetti and double bass with David Walter at Juilliard, where he earned masters and doctoral degrees in both subjects.

Following the focus and intensity of the conservatory environment, Christopher Roberts shouldered his bass and went to live alone in PNG, on a quest to understand natural prosody in music.

This Thursday the Los Angeles Music Festival [pictured] will feature a major work by Roberts, Trios for Deep Voices, a composition for three double basses inspired by the music of PNG.

Roberts will be joined by two bass players from the Los Angeles Opera Orchestra. The composer writes about Trios for Deep Voices:

In 1981, I ran off to the jungles of PNG to study the natural prosody of music. I lived with the people of the Star Mountains and introduced them to my double bass, while they introduced me to their songs. I took part in drumbeat initiations and listened to the sound of hornbills in flight. I was overwhelmed. I had a dream in which I moved my bow across the strings of the bass in an entirely new way that recreated the drums, and the hornbills' wings, and the voices of the people whose every song tells a story.

The sounds in New Guinea and their constant shaping and recurrence hit me right away as a deep signature of a place, the way the water moved through its gorges, the tone of the insects, the way people there would sing, and the particular choruses of the birds. In fact I cannot imagine the vocal music without the environment surrounding, as my house was as open as a woven basket, and the sounds of the rivers and insects followed the cycle of day and night, drought or deluge. To remember songs, I stand near streams.

The Trios describe being in New Guinea, as the strings of a bass would tell it.  Hearing the hornbills in a mist-shrouded forest moving across the unseen world just above you … the atmosphere of being outside at dusk with the insects screaming and the water rushing … initiation ceremony music, when men as “hornbills” beating only taro enter the ritual house to become "birds of paradise" and emerge beating actual drums.

In the composition of music, I work with the medium of a written score, and the natural idiomatic way of a given instrument, following the technical inclinations of resonant strings .… Over time, over years, the impressions, the motifs most resilient in improvisation and memory unfold their stories to me in a developing variation proportionately whorled like some sort of topography across the score paper.

The first trio describes the initiation, and what it was like to be there in it. … The harmonic lyric contours describe the echo of the initiates singing as they approached the ritual house at a dead run straight up the mountain. … [in the booklet] my photos of the houses up in the Star Mountains evoke every sensation of being there, where you would be if you were singing in the way of the slow movements. … Some trios begin as lone preambles, and all are gathered into contemporary chamber music forms that I could relate to my friends.

Beginnings of the modern art movement

BY MELANIE EASTBURN

LIMITED EDITION PRINTMAKING was introduced into PNG in the late 1960s and reached its peak of popularity in the 1970s. The practice began to fade in the 1980s and has now virtually disappeared.

The prints produced belong to a specific period of social, political, artistic, literary and educational change in png. Created by artists from a diversity of backgrounds, the works present strong and vibrant images that continue to resonate.

On 21 November 1969 an exhibition of woodcuts by Mathias Kauage and screenprints by Taita (Marie) Aihi and English expatriate Georgina Beier opened at the University of Papua New Guinea’s Centre for New Guinea Cultures in Port Moresby. The show, probably the earliest to include prints by Papua New Guinean artists, was organised by Georgina and Ulli Beier.

Aihi, a Roro woman from Waima, was 18 years old and had lived most of her life on Yule Island Catholic Mission when she met Georgina Beier and was encouraged to pursue a career in textile design in Port Moresby. Kauage, on the other hand, had tracked down an initially dubious Georgina Beier after finding inspiration in an exhibition of drawings by (Timothy) Akis which she had organised in February 1969.

Akis’ exhibition was extraordinary not only because the artist, from Tsembaga Village in the Simbai Valley, Madang Province, had started drawing seriously just six weeks before the show opened, but also because it was essentially the first exhibition of ‘contemporary’ art by a Papua New Guinean artist.

Contemporary or ‘new’ art using imported techniques and materials is largely an urban concern in PNG, with work carried out either in dedicated municipal settings, or in specific schools and cultural centres outside of them. The reasons for this are practical as well as cultural; it is in those places that the necessary equipment and materials are most readily available and ‘artist’ as a personal career choice was not, until recently, part of Papua New Guinean culture.

While those with exceptional artistic skill were acknowledged and appreciated, they also participated in the everyday activities demanded by culture and survival. As writer, researcher and collector of PNG’s  contemporary art, Hugh Stevenson, put it: ‘The idea of a person exclusively subsisting by art production and dedicated in his thinking only to art would have been exceptional’.

During the 1960s Akis worked intermittently as an interpreter and source for a number of anthropologists, drawing in order to communicate designs or ideas that were difficult to describe in pidgin.

Georgida Buchbinder, an anthropologist from Columbia University, was taken with Akis’ sketches and, when he travelled with her to Port Moresby in January 1969, showed his work to Georgina Beier who she suspected would find them intriguing. Aware of his potential, Georgina Beier encouraged Akis in his drawing.

Trumpet blowing never goes astray

BY PHIL FITZPATRICK

PNG ATTITUDE has been slowly and surely reviving a literary sub-species that had all but turned up its toes a few years ago.

What I’m talking about is the journeyman essay; the common or garden variety of a form of comment that has everywhere now retreated to the rarefied pages of the broadsheets and struggling journals as jargon-infested obscurities pushing particular points of view and only read by the so-called intelligentsia.

The culprit, of course, has been television.  Radio enhanced the common essay but television, in its relentless quest to dumb everything down to a basic level so it can sell things, is the real villain.

Television’s appeal is visceral rather than intellectual.  It preaches to the converted.  It is a powerful medium for all the wrong reasons.  It is credited with bringing down the iron curtain but, in fact, what it was doing was simply exporting consumer greed.

In Australia it demonstrated that the vision of a rough handshake or people and their children jumping off a refugee boat can affect the outcome of an election.  Television, with few exceptions, is stupid and it can rot your brain; treat it very carefully.

In the glory days of the common essay the exponents were people like G K Chesterton and George Orwell.  In Australia the master was Walter Murdoch, who, of all people, was the great-uncle of that arch-capitalist Rupert Murdoch.

The modest and genial Walter Murdoch summed up the genre most succinctly when he said the essay “is not a statement of facts, it is not a cold abstract argument, it is not an inflammatory harangue; it is a quiet talk, reflecting the personal likes and dislikes of the author.  It never pretends to treat a subject exhaustively; it is brief, informal, modest”.

In Australia Walter’s baton has probably and most significantly been taken up by Clive James.  In Papua New Guinea the homilies of Paulias Matane and the column in The National by Russell Soaba spring to mind.

As an old form that is now burgeoning on the internet, the blogs of Emmanuel Narokobi, Effrey Dademo, Steve Winduo and, latterly, Martyn Namorong are prime examples. Care should be taken to distinguish these blogs from sites like Facebook, which are trivial by comparison.

While they are great blogs you virtually have to stumble across them by accident. This where PNG Attitude comes into its own.  By cross fertilising with these other blogs and having its own select cadre of contributors like Reg Renagi, Paul Oates and regrettably and infrequently John (Moses) Fowke, linked to a readership that is growing exponentially it can cultivate the genre very successfully.

If you want entertainment and you want to be told what you want to hear you can watch television.  If you want to know what’s going on in the world and Papua New Guinea in particular and you want fodder for your brain read PNG Attitude.

Prote-J taking ‘em by storm in the USA

BY KEITH JACKSON

 

THE FLORIDA-BASED Prote-J (real name maybe Jabre' Trawick) is an up-and-coming hip hop composer, producer and musician born in Los Angeles to a Papuan mum and a US dad.

As a child in Milne Bay, he was raised by his mother and grandmother in a small village, where he immersed himself in music. His grandmother taught him to speak Suau by teaching him hymns. At age seven he started playing the guitar and entertained the entire village.

Returning to the US, he taught himself to play drums, bass and piano, completed high school and earned a bachelor’s degree from an aeronautical university.

“I came across your blog and it has a lot of good info on PNG,” wrote Prote-J’s manager Ben Witherspoon (www.AjustEntertainment.com) in an email. “We just released his new music video with some footage from his home in PNG.” That’s the song you can see at the head of this piece.

Who is Prote-J? I’m a rapper, producer, and songwriter who was born in the States but raised in PNG. I released my first mixtape last year and it’s been downloaded over 20,000 times!

How did you get started? I moved back to the US when I was 12 and that’s when I really got into hip hop. I wasn’t exposed to much hip hop in PNG, and I pretty much fell in love with it when my cousin put me on to a few Jay-Z songs. I always loved writing songs as a kid but as soon as I hit puberty I realised I didn’t have much of a singing voice. That’s when I really started to write rap songs.

How would you describe your music? Simply put, it’s hip hop with lyrical content, wordplay and dope beats. The beats are good enough to blast in your car, and there should be enough quotable lines to fill up your Facebook status for quite some time.

How was your experience growing up in PNG? Life was extremely different. My family didn't have much so we pretty much lived day to day, but that was fine 'cuz we were happy. I went to school in the city, but I'd always go back to the islands to visit my family. Instead of playing video games or going to the movies, me and my friends went fishing or spear diving in the ocean. That's what we did for fun. I also played a lot of soccer, drank a ton of coconut milk, and I spent most nights playing my guitar on my grandmother's veranda.

How much of an influence has it been on your music? It completely shaped me as a person and a musician. I wouldn't be the artist I am today if I didn't grow up over there. My mother raised me in church, and that's where I really started playing instruments and developing my talent. I was taught to have a very positive outlook on life, so I always try to directly reflect that in my music.

Sources: Ajust Entertainment, Chicago Now and Dream Write Now

Australian composer is a friend of Melanesia

BY PETER KRANZ

 

DAVID BRIDIE is a long time friend of PNG and West Papua who has promoted many Melanesian musical artists over the year - most notably the incomparable George Telek.

He is himself a renowned musician and performer, with such bands as My Friend the Chocolate Cake and Not Drowning, Waving.

He has also produced many memorable musical scores including the music for the TV series Remote Area Nurse. He has also written several soundtracks for Aussie films, notably The Man Who Sued God in 2001 and The Circuit in 2007-10.

David has visited PNG many times and recorded much traditional music before it is lost - particularly noteworthy are his field recordings of traditional flute playing and singing by Simbu women.

He is currently touring the northern province of New Caledonia to coincide with the South Pacific Games and is performing with artists Telek, Richard Mogu, Airi Ingram and Lea Rumwaropen.

One of his recent projects is Strange Birds in Paradise - a tribute to the many and varied cultures of West Papua. It will be released on 10 June on the Wantok label. See here for details: http://www.waterfrontrecords.com/product/77793. I'll be getting a copy for sure!

If you are not familiar with his wonderful music, I recommend the album Succumb from 2008 as an introduction. It has much PNG influence - including some Simbu traditional singing.

Pata

BY PETER CAHILL

HE WAS SHORT and squat and hairy: rather like a 40 litre drum in a black Angora sweater. An Einstein mane of grey-threaded black hair tumbled riotously over a woven yellow and red neck-band into his waist-length beard.

He carried a black palm walking staff, heavily carved, and his bare feet were as hard and agile as any Highlands villager’s. In the creased photograph a slash of smiling teeth split his face. A calloused hand, knotted with arthritis, was hooked in the rope cinching his mud-stained soutane.

‘Who’s this?’ I asked the Cathedral archivist.

‘Father Franz-Paul Schnee, yes’ – he saw the look on my face. ‘I’m told he’s a distant relative of a prominent German family rich in artistic and musical talent. Known as Pata (Pidgin English for Father) to his mates – black, white and yellow – he arrived in what became known as the Western High-lands of mainland New Guinea in the late 1920s. By himself. God alone knows how he passed unscathed through the warring tribes on the way.

‘Look’ – The archivist opened a box. ‘These are our holdings on him. The man was an unrecognised saint.’

I settled into a chair, pulled the box towards me and lost myself. Pata had attended Göttingen University, breezed through philosophy and law degrees, read ethnography and anthropology for pleasure before deciding to enter the priesthood. The Society of the Divine Word (SVD) fathers accepted him and said he would be sent to former German New Guinea after he was ordained.

He reached Lae on the mainland coast by Norddeutsche Lloyd steamer via Singapore, asked an incredulous policeman to point him in the direction of the largely unpacified Highlands, and started walking.

Through his diaries I read how he threaded his way through showers of bone-tipped arrows and nipa-palm spears which fell dangerously close during inter-village fighting, and the threats of plumed and painted warriors on arrival at his chosen village. He smiled and blessed them.

They turned away, puzzled, but soon accepted him. Some built him a house and sent women with pointed digging sticks to break clods of hard clay for a food garden. He smiled his thanks, but shook his head at their offer of a woman or boy to keep him warm at night. The warriors were again puzzled.

Pata moved among the villagers, his quick ear picking up words and phrases. He was soon able to guide their inter-village trading and made sure each side received fair value. He eagerly accepted the government offer of bush materials for a hospital and supervised its construction so carefully there was sufficient left over for a small school.

No longer puzzled, the warriors gave him an old woman to maintain his garden and ensure there were always tubers of kaukau (sweet potato) slowly cooking in his fire coals. Pata had seen bloody carcases prepared for roasting on his way into the Highlands and never quite sure if they were human or animal, became a vegetarian for the rest of his life. He thought it wise not to mention the concept of the Body of Christ in his sermons.

The under-recognised artists of PNG

BY PHIL FITZPATRICK

 

WHEN YOU TRAVEL around Papua New Guinea you come across art in unexpected places.

As you step off your aeroplane at Jacksons Airport and enter the terminal the art confronts you as murals above the stairs, continuing on along the walls in the custom’s hall.

It’s something to admire while you wait in the long queue to get your passport stamped.

Outside there are concrete reliefs holding up the veranda and across the way the hotels display it too.

The art, particularly the paintings, are an old tradition adapted to a new format which is both innovative and exciting and receives very little recognition outside PNG.

When we were casting about for images for the cover of Sil Bolkin’s new book The Flight of Galkope, which is set in the Simbu Province, Sil suggested we look at the art of Simon Tagai from Kundiawa’s Gembogl district.

Some of Simon’s work, called Simbu True Life Tales, adorns the walls of the Mt Wilhelm Tourist Hotel in downtown Kundiawa.  Look at this wonderful impression here. And check out the website at www.mtwilhelmhotel.com.pg.

 

Simon attended the Creative Arts Faculty at the University of Papua New Guinea in the early 1990s but left in his third year when he ran out of money to pay his tuition fees.  Since then he has been a freelance painter.

We reckon he’s in his late 30s but can’t ask him because he has just disappeared into the mountains with his brushes and palette.

 

A tribute to the great choirs of Melanesia

BY PETER KRANZ

 

WHEN I FIRST went to PNG my Dad (who had served there in World War II) said rather cryptically, "Listen to some Melanesian choirs".

I didn't immediately understand what he meant, but he was a skilled Church choral conductor for over half a century so his advice was worth taking.

Well amidst student riots, political turmoil, raskols shooting my neighbours and robbing my house, I did find time to listen some Melanesian choirs.

My neighbour was a member of the local Catholic choir of a Moresby church which often used to practice at his house.

So I had the great privilege of listening to some of the most beautiful singing I have ever heard - from my front door. God bless you Vincent.

The video is a tribute to them. It is not their choir (whose recordings I cannot find) but it sounds very similar.

Let’s learn English with a little whimsy

BY PETER KRANZ

MY WIFE ROSE has been teaching me some of the childhood rhymes she learned when being taught English in Simbu.

Here's a lovely one.

You have to sing it to appreciate the beautiful whimsy of this liklik rhyme. It’s of the nursery-rhyme form - ask a question and sing the answer  (common the world over).

Go-Go 7 miles
Go-Go 7 miles -
I saw a pretty girl walking down the road
I have no money to pay the bus, so I walk down the road.
Where's your money?
In my pocket.
Where's your pocket?
I forgot it!

Download Go go 7 mile

Struggling to write? Then prepare a draft

BY TIMOTHY KWARA

HERE AT THE Christian Leader Training College near Banz, I have often seen people struggling to write.

The problem is that they just go straight to the computer and work on their assignment, essay or documents that they want to write.

I remember what one of my Journalism lecturers told me many years ago at UPNG: if you want talk on the phone, you must make a list of what to say. This will save you time and money.

You will find that someone who has not done a draft or brainstormed about what to write will keep looking at the empty space and really struggle. Therefore it is important to have an outline, do brainstorming and make draft copy.

When you have a draft, it will save you time. As you type and carry on, you will work fast and efficiently. You may change some things as you go along but it will be helpful to have a draft.

The same thing can be done, if you are giving a speech. Some people are good at keeping mental notes while others want to have a draft of a speech which will help them to say what they want.

When there is no draft, the writer will be lost. So much time will be lost as there is lack of planning. Someone once said that good writing starts in the mind.

________________

Timothy Kwara grew up in Central Province and in 2000 went to Banz. He is a journalist by profession but he now teaches, writes, preaches and attends part-time Bachelor of Theology studies. He publishes the Melanesian Scribe blog that looks at writing and encourages Melanesians to write more

Source: Melanesian Scribe http://tkwara.blogspot.com

Trying to get a fix on PNG’s creative arts

BY PETER KRANZ

I AM INTERESTED in some of the creative arts initiatives that blossomed in PNG after independence, and there were many of them.

They included the Arts Faculty at the University of PNG, so strongly influenced by Ulli Beier (after whom the creative arts complex at UPNG is named), the National Museum, National Archives, the Raun Raun Theatre, the National Cultural Council, and the National Broadcasting Corporation.

They attracted some leading figures in the world of creative arts, in music, painting, theatre, dance and sound recording.

So what happened to the vision of these ground-breaking institutions? Here's information on some of them. Readers may br able to assist with others.

Maggi Sietsma AM (born 1951) is the founding artistic director of the multiple-award winning Brisbane contemporary dance company, the Expressions Dance Company, and is regarded as one of Australia's leading choreographers.

Maggi has choreographed multiple international dance works during her career and has contributed extensively to dance and dance education in Australia. She was affiliated with the Raun Raun Theatre Company, PNG and performed with them many times.

The Life Drama Research Team (QUT) and the Life Drama participants are engaged in practice-led research, as they collaboratively create, test, and report on new forms of educational drama.

Practice-led research requires that the researchers first practice, and then rigorously investigate their practice. The results of this investigation are shared, not only through conventional text reporting, but through further practice which is documented through digital photography, video and sound recording.

A specific example of practice-led research is the two-week Theatre Exchange Laboratory held in Madang in January-February 2010. Practice included the performance of traditional songs and dances by ex-members of Raun Raun Theatre and current members of the National Performing Arts Troupe; excerpts from “folk operas” and “village plays“devised by Raun Raun Theatre and performed by members; and examples of Life Drama forms.

The Raun Raun Theatre came into existence in 1975 at the suggestion of Professor Ulli Beier from the Institute of PNG Studies. The project architects were Paul Frame and Rex Addison.

"In early April, 1975, the Raun Raun Traveling Theatre was formed in Goroka with a grant from the National Cultural Council. A theatre truck was purchased with some help from the Goroka Rotary Club and housing was granted by District Authorities to accommodate drama students on the one hand and director/office on the other.

“The Theatre’s original function was to travel with maket raun, a suggested scheme for taking public services, private sector activities and entertainment to a circuit of large village centres around the area."

Greg Murphy was the Director of Raun Raun Theatre and there was a close working relationship between the School of Art and Design at Goroka Technical College and his company. I believe Greg still works at the Madang centre or UPNG, but the Raun Raun has gone into something of a decline.

There is a new generation of PNG creative artists who have made their name in the field of music (check out my cousin-sis-in law Emi Maria!), but the older vision of an inclusive artistic impetus for a new country seems to have fallen by the wayside.

On collecting books about Papua New Guinea

BY PHILIP FITZPATRICK

I started collecting books about Papua New Guinea in 1966 when I applied for a job as a Cadet Patrol Officer. In those days my tastes ran to the likes of Jack Hides and other adventure writers.

I’ve been collecting books ever since, but my tastes have mellowed over the years and the genres have widened considerably.

It’s not an especially expensive hobby - books about PNG don’t fetch big prices - but it does involve lurking about the dustier sanctums of secondhand book shops or rummaging through the stalls of library sell-offs and in places like Vinnies.

If I’m desperate for a special book, I’ll search the web and reluctantly pay the much higher prices that dealers demand.

I generally carry around a list of books that I’m seeking, and the act of crossing off a rare find is a real buzz.

Over the years I’ve accumulated about 250 volumes. If you’re interested you can see the list here. Download Phil's Booklist

The genres have become distinctive as the collection has grown. Because I do social mapping, there is a collection of anthropological and historical volumes and a bunch of reference books like the excellent Encyclopaedia of Papua New Guinea.

Then comes all the stuff written by kiaps, the odd doctor and, surprisingly, only a few teachers.

Then there is fiction, again dominated by kiaps, with a thin sliver of Papuan New Guinean writers.

One genre I tend to avoid are military topics, mainly because I’ve had an aversion to things martial ever since a certain lottery in the 1960s, and because there is so much of it published that I’d never be able to find the space.

I did enjoy Eric Feldt’s The Coastwatchers, however, and think it is a far superior work than the recent blatant rehash.

Another genre I’ve avoided is missionary literature. Much of that is pedantic, mildly racist and too self righteous for me. When I went to Uni, Marxism was the go; being a working anthropologist doesn’t help either. Each to his own.

However, I enjoyed Ben Butcher’s We Lived with Headhunters immensely and also APH Freund’s Missionary Turns Spy.

I worked with Harold Freund researching and writing a monograph on his Kukukuku artefact collection before he died in the late 1990s. That otherwise gentle and devout pastor harboured a hatred for the wartime Japanese that was chilling.

Which brings me to the point of this rambling yarn – one Hosea Linge, or Ligeremaluoga as he was known.

Ligeremaluoga was a Papua New Guinean and also a missionary. More than that, he was the first Papua New Guinean to write a book.

Vincent Eri published the first Papua New Guinean novel, The Crocodile, in 1970 but Ligeremaluoga wrote and published the first book way back in 1932.

It was a memoir and he wrote it in his native New Ireland Kuanua language. It was translated by Ella Collins for publication by FW Cheshire in Australia.

Until recently the book has been largely dismissed. Ulli Beier thought that Ligeremaluoga was just mouthing the religious platitudes of his white teachers and suspected that Collins’ contribution was more than mere translation.

Ulli also thought the book, because of its religious flavour, had contributed to the destruction of the culture of Ligeremalouga’s people. He especially thought the title, The Erstwhile Savage, was terrible.

Ulli was anti-colonial and taught that way. Only a few of his students, like Russell Soaba, questioned that line of thought.

With that sort of recommendation one might be wary of seeking out a copy. Don’t be deterred. It’s a lively book with some very interesting and original history. 

If you can’t get a copy of the original, he published an updated version in 1978 called An Offering Fit for a King, which I hear might be republished soon.

The subject matter might not be so relevant now but its place in the annals of Papua New Guinea literature is very important. The book sits very comfortably in my collection.

If you want to know more about him Eric Johns wrote about Ligeremaluoga of Kono in the Famous People of PNG series published by Longman in 2002.

The splendid Holman Collection goes on sale

FOUR SPLENDID works of art from the man who designed the Papua New Guinea crest, Hal Holman OL OAM, have been made available in a limited series of four numbered prints featuring selected images of PNG subjects.

And you can purchase them through PNG Attitude and assist the cause of establishing a memorial to one of Australia’s greatest tragedies that directly affected PNG>

Haldane Sinclair Holman has been associated with PNG for nearly 70 years and still visits frequently. Last year he received the Order of Logohu to add to the Order of Australia with which he’d been previously honoured.

Now pushing 90, Hal was a World War II commando in PNG and returned after the war as senior government artist.

Many of his paintings and sculptures are to be found in Port Moresby, including busts of PNG's six Prime Ministers that grace the grounds of Parliament House and a bronze of Queen Elizabeth II at Government House in Konedobu.

Hal’s sculptures can also be seen in the Botanical Gardens and on the Supreme Court building. His largest work is the five metre high stainless steel Bird of Paradise that dominates Sir John Guise Drive in Waigani.

Hal’s passion for PNG can be seen in his Bird of Paradise and his impressions of the heroic features of the indigenous people. His paintings and drawings are in private collections and in galleries throughout the world.

Now PNG Attitude offers four works of art for sale to readers at $50 each or $150 a set of four, with proceeds going to build the Rabaul and Montevideo Maru Memorial in Canberra.

The price of each of the originals runs into thousands of dollars, but these quality prints are indistinguishable from them. They’re A2 size and printed on 200 gsm art board. They are supplied unframed and dispatched in mailing tubes post free.

Contact benelong@bigpond.net.au for details of how you can purchase all or any of these prints.

Print 1 – Central Highlander

Print 2 - Greater Bird of Paradise

Print 3 – Blue Bird of Paradise

Print 4 – Striped Angel Fish

Papua New Guinea: A writing heritage

BY PHILIP FITZPATRICK

IN THE YEARS leading up to Independence and for a short time afterwards literature flowered in Papua New Guinea.

One of the reasons for this was the need felt by many Papua New Guineans to examine their place in the world in those radical times.

The question for many was: who are we and where do we want to go? Writing about it seemed a logical thing to do.

Impetus was given by the establishment of a creative writers’ course at the embryonic University of Papua New Guinea by the irrepressible Ulli Beier.

The first novel by a Papuan writer, Vincent Eri’s The Crocodile came out of that course and Ulli also had a hand in Albert Maori Kiki’s Ten Thousand Years in a Lifetime and Michael Somare’s Sana.

Under Ulli’s benign guidance a journal of Papua New Guinea literature, Kovave, also appeared. In the first volume prose such as Peter Lus’ My Head is as Black as the Soil of our Country, John Kadiba’s Tax and Kumalau Tawali’s Island Life appeared along with John Waiko’s play The Unexpected Hawk.

The Papua Pocket poets, a series of booklets, appeared shortly thereafter and included works like John Kasaipwalova’s Reluctant Flame.

Some of this literature had a distinctly anti-colonialist tone. This was not instigated by Ulli Beier but he didn’t discourage it either.

Some of the more virulent anti-colonialists were, in fact, colonialists themselves, the expatriate academics at the UPNG. They enjoyed nothing better than taunting and baiting the Australian administration. Mind you, there were people in the administration who needed taunting.

Ironically it was the students of these leftie firebrands who took a more balanced and conciliatory view of the march towards nationhood.

Some of the other writers active at this time, in no particular order, were, Peter Lus, Wairu Degoba, Pokwari Kale, Allan Natachee (Avaisa Pinongo), Leo Hannett, Rabbie Namaliu, Arthur Jawodimbari, Turuk Wabei, Bob Giegao, Jacob Simet, Jack Lahui, Clemens Runawery, Peter Wia Paiya, Renagi Lohia, Joseph Saruva, Herman Talingapua and Ikini Yaboyang.

This is by no means a comprehensive list. Prior to 1975 many Papua New Guinean public servants and others in sensitive positions published material anonymously or by using a pseudonym to protect themselves and their jobs.

Some of them should perhaps now stand up and be acknowledged for their contributions.

You can read the complete version of Phil Fitzpatrick’s essay here. The essay was written for the Independence Day supplement of the PNG Post-Courier on 16 September 2010.