III. Kamoro Art: Traditional context

Kamoro art functions in the context of a succession of feasts and ceremonies. The principal theme in the feasts is the indissoluble unity of life and death, and the renewal of life. The deceased people represented in Kamoro sculptures, carved panels, and masks, therefore personified death itself, and from that perspective they played a role in ceremonies and rituals.
In some rituals 'woman' - the bringer of new life - and female fertility played an important role. The celebration of the renewal of life was linked to renewal in art and material culture: new canoes, new prow ornaments, paddles, and sago bowls, were made especially for feasts of this kind. Once the feast was over, the objects had fulfilled their ceremonial function, and were often abandoned in the sago swamps, to enable the spirits associated with these items to exercise a fertile influence on the sago palms. ^[27]

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