Korwars, amulets, a skull in a basket and a snake figure

Mission
The photo was taken at a time when Dutch missionaries were spreading Christianity in New Guinea. Protestants were active in the north of the island, Catholics in the south. Frans van Hasselt had been spreading the Gospel among the Papuans in northwest New Guinea for the Utrecht Mission Society (UZV) since 1894. It was uphill work for the first few years, but in 1907, two years before Demmeni took this photo, Papuans began converting en masse.

Purge
Korwars - small ancestor figures which were key elements in the traditional Papuan religion - became the target of an iconoclastic purge. Missionaries asked the Papuans to surrender their korwars and many were burned. Large consignments were also sent to the Netherlands, where they were exhibited, fot instance at a show to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the Utrecht Mission Society in 1909. Displayed like some exotic trophy, they symbolised the victory of Christian faith over idolatry and provided tangible evidence of the mission’s success.

Neat
For the photo, Demmeni placed various korwars and other objects in neat rows on a neutral cloth. All these items had been surrendered by newly converted Papuans to Frans van Hasselt. The photo, which was ostensibly intended as a cultural anthropological record, actually provides visual evidence of the mission’s success.

Still on display
What subsequently happened to bulk of these objects is no longer known. Some were probably destroyed. Interestingly, in relation to this photo, three of the objects shown can still be seen. The korwar top right found its way into a private collection. The dark korwar containing the skull, in the centre on the shelf, and the spiral serpent figure are at the World Museum in Rotterdam.

13 x 18cm (5 1/8 x 7 1/16in.)

Source: collectie.tropenmuseum.nl