Films & Video

A World Away
30 minutes/color/video/1993/English
Colleen Needles and Gary Feblowitz
Source (U.S.) American Museum of Asmat Art

Supported by CBS TV, Needles and Feblowitz traveled to Asmat to study and photograph the Asmat environment and feasts. This video gives a very good introduction to the Asmat people and their culture in current times.

Matjemosh: A Woodcarver
27 minutes/color/16mm/1964/Netherlands/English
Dir. Adrian A. Gerbrands
Prod. Agency: Stichting Film En Wetenschap; Universitaire Film, Utrecht, Netherlands
Source (U.S.): University of California Extension Center
Source (U.S.): Rental-see Educational Film & Video Locator
Intl. Source: British Film Institute (GB)

Ethnographic documentary shows Matjemosh, a woodcarver of the Asmat tribe on the southwest coast of New Guinea, creating several works of art and speaking about his life, his beliefs, and his craft. He uses a stone hammer and iron chisel to make wooden carvings of his ancestors and decorate bamboo signal horns of the kind his ancestors used to blow on headhunting raids. Shows the process of making a drum: finding the right tree, digging out the pith, hollowing the inside into the traditional conical shape, polishing the outside with a shell and finishing with a handle composed of a praying mantis with human hands and feet. Includes scenes of everyday life in the village of Amanamkai.

Commentary by Dr. Adrian A. Gerbrands, Assoc. Dir., National Museum of Ethnology, Leiden.

Collection: MMA

The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Michael C. Rockefeller Wing of Primitive Art Videodisc
Variable running time/color/videodisc/1983/United States/English
Dir. Gene Fairly; Prod. Thomas Newman, Robb Cresse, Anne Marie Garti
Exec. Prod. Douglas Newton, Robb Creese
Prod. Agency: The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Source (U.S.): The Metropolitan Museum of Art (in-house viewing)

Interactive videodisc in the Michael C. Rockefeller Wing of Primitive Art at the Metropolitan Museums of Art which allows visitors to gather more information about items exhibited. Provides twenty-four one-minute film segments on aspects of four cultures represented in the galleries: the Asmat of New Guinea, the Aztec of Mexico, the Cameroon of West Africa, and the Northwest Coast Indians of North America. Covers such topics as traditional architecture, the role of art in daily life, and specific uses of masks and ceremonial costumes. Uses slides, photographs, authentic sound recordings, and rare ethnographic film footage.

Collection: MMA