Latest Book by Rod Ewins "Traditional Fijian Artefacts"

Rod Ewins

Traditional

FIJIAN ARTEFACTS

[Best viewed at 1344 x 1840 or higher]

The most recent book on the material culture of Fiji,Traditional Fijian Artefacts, was published in July 2014 by Just Pacific in association with the Tasmanian Museum & Art Gallery, Hobart and the Queen Victoria Museum & Art Gallery, Launceston.

It was produced in a small run and stocks are now very low, and all copies held by Just Pacific have now been sold. They are selling secondhand online for exorbitant prices. The two Tasmanian museum shops had stocks, but I know the TMAG only had two copies left in April 2023. However as a last resort, it would still be worth emailing museumshop@tmag.tas.gov.au OR shop@qvmag.tas.gov.au

Those within Fiji might try to obtain the book from the USP Bookshop for the last copies that are available in Fiji.

ISBN : 978-0-646-91698-9

The book is in paperback, viii + 212 pages, and measures 21 x 26 cm

llustrations include 2 cover photos and 370 illustrations, most in colour, including maps and original drawings. Very large bibliography and index.

Please click to see List of Contents

The following are a few typical facing-page spreads from the book

Back cover note:

Art has always been integral to the culture of the indigenous people of Fiji. Its quality was quickly recognised by the first Westerners to visit, who collected it avidly, and a quantity of material found its way to Tasmania. It came via seamen for whom the busy port of Hobart was a transit stop or a home port; from Wesleyan missionaries headquartered there for a time and then continued to support the Mission in Fiji; and from collectors who have either donated or sold their collections to public museums since the early 19th Century. This book brings together objects from all of these sources, illustrating them and providing contextual information in words and pictures of their physical qualities and historical social importance. Many have never been published previously. 01 primary importance are the collections of Tasmania's two principal museums, which have actively collaborated in and contributed to this book, Those items are supplemented with material from other smaller collections, including the author's own.

Rod Ewins was born and raised in Fiji as a fourth-generation member of an early settler family. Educated in Fiji, Australia and England, his formal qualifications are in art, education and sociology/anthropology. His professional career has been as a practising artist and art educator, primarily at the University of Tasmania. With extensive fieldwork throughout Fiji, he has published many papers and book chapters, and several books, on traditional art and society.