Rectangular tapa fragment. thick, stiff cloth with a highly decorated front side of black geometric designs on a turmeric based yellow-orange ground, plain back. Front decoration divided into five rectangles, each outlined with a black line and filled with different patterns of chevrons, diamonds, and star shapes. This fragment was cut from a larger sample. Tapa is a cloth made from the inner bark of trees and is widely used in the Pacific for clothing and bedding, as well as secular, sacred, and ceremonial uses. This fragment is from the Santa Cruz Islands, probably Nendo, where tapa is known as lepau.
tapa (bark cloth)
tapa (bark cloth)
"55" and "Tucopia" (handwritten in pencil)
Original To Stephen Phillips House (Salem, Mass.),
Unknown
Pacific Island Group
20 (H) (inches)
Gift of the Stephen Phillips Memorial Chariable Trust for Historic Preservation
2006.44.3668
full digital copy available on Google Play
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