CU receives artifacts from rainforest support group

Graduate student Lêda Martins, left, and Laura Johnson-Kelly, curator of the Anthropology Collections, display the recently acquired Amazonian artifacts in 150 McGraw Hall. Frank DiMeo/University Photography

By Franklin Crawford

Anthropology isn't a discipline known for setting land-speed records. But just days after Amanaka'a, a Manhattan-based rain-forest support group, offered a substantial gift of rare Amazonian artifacts, the donation joined the permanent collection of the Cornell anthropology department's museum in McGraw Hall.

"The call came on a Friday and by the following Wednesday our curator was driving down in a van to get the materials here," said Theodore Bestor, professor of anthropology. "We were able to arrange, almost overnight, for the Anthropology Collections to receive Amanaka'a's collection of Amazonian artifacts."

The transfer was made through the heads-up efforts of Terry Turner, a professor of anthropology, Laura Johnson-Kelly, curator of the Anthropology Collections, Lêda Martins, a doctoral candidate in anthropology, who is herself Brazilian, and Bestor, the acting chair of the department.

"Many of the artifacts are of a kind and quality not usually allowed to be exported," said Bestor. "They were carefully collected with the cooperation of indigenous groups and so the collection also has extensive documentation of the objects and their contexts."

Among the items are ceremonial artifacts, such as brilliant feathered head dresses, masks, beautifully woven baskets, wooden tools and implements such as bows, arrows, blow guns, ceramics and a variety of carvings, including a bench in the shape of a capybara, the world's largest rodent. The pieces are housed in the Anthropology Collections, a small but impressive museum with about 13,000 permanent holdings.

With the exception of some Andean pottery and a few handmade bags, this new collection constitutes the first ethnographic materials of South American origin in the museum, said Johnson-Kelly.

The source of these Amazonian gifts is a beleaguered, nonprofit organization called Amanaka'a. The group advocates for Brazil's rainforest people, whose very existence is threatened by cattle ranching, gold mining, logging and wanton development. Amanaka'a itself is struggling to survive an onslaught of debts incurred after promoting a lavish weeklong Amazonian festival in 1996. The event was to be financed largely by the Brazilian government. When the government failed to pick up the tab, Amanaka'a was left in the lurch. The group has not disbanded, but staff closed its New York offices in October.

Cornell received about a third of Amanaka'a's collections. Other pieces were donated to the National Museum of the American Indian in New York, and some items were retained.

Acquisition of indigenous artifacts is often a controversial issue. But Bestor explained this is "quite a different situation because these are artifacts that were produced and collected for exhibition in the United States through a collaboration of the Amazonian indigenous peoples and a rain-forest advocacy group, with the cooperation of the Brazilian government."

The range and depth of the collection is extremely unusual in North America, said Turner, a renowned expert on Amazonian cultures and on indigenous rights. He will join Cornell's faculty in January, after many years on the faculty of the University of Chicago.

"Amanaka'a didn't just limit its collections to Indians (or indigenous forest people), but included artifacts from the Brazilian people who live along the Amazon River, rubber tappers and others," Turner said. "Many of these things are new -- some made within the last decade. These artifacts come from vital cultures and societies that are alive today."

The destruction of the Amazon is not just a story about the indigenous people, Turner added, but about the Brazilian people who also are affected by the devastation. Increasingly, anthropologists are an important link between endangered cultures and the world.

"Indigenous advocacy and the defense of people like the Brazil forest dwellers is becoming a much more important part of anthropology, and Cornell is very much engaged in that work," Turner said. "This collection really comes out of the struggle to support indigenous and forest people and their environment and gives us a chance to emphasize this aspect of anthropology."

Martins, who joined Johnson-Kelly in the one-day, rental-van excursion to get the items from New York City to Ithaca, is translating the collection catalog, written in Portuguese. A small exhibition is being planned.