Tapuvae stilt stirrup

For more than five decades, this very rare stilt bracket served as a coat hook attached to the back of the kitchen door of a home in Raleigh, North Carolina

Tapuvae depicting tiki in the classical position, arms and hands resting on the stomach, are numerous in public and private collections. Models with raised arms are rarer. Even rarer are models with one arm raised (left or right), the hand under the chin.

Very few examples are listed:

A model was presented at the exhibition Adorning the World, Art of the Marquesas Islands at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (May 2005, January 2006) and reproduced in the catalog on page 96.

One model was sold at Christie’s Paris on June 19, 2013 (lot21) and another at Sotheby’s London, from the Paul Guillaume collection, on March 27, 1985 (lot 140).

One model is in the collections of the British Museum ( Inv OC,+206) and another at the Museum Funf Kontinente in Munich.

Finally, one model (part of a pair) was exhibited at TEFAF Maastricht 2025 by the gallery Voyageur et curieux (Cat n°6).