Two Young Girls - Wooden Bust, Ainu Work, Hokkaido - Late Showa Era. #874

Direct carving, probably in keyaki wood. About the Ainu: aboriginal population of northern Japan. Arrived around the 14th century BC, in the Kuril Islands and Sakhalin. During the Meiji era, forced assimilation prohibited their culture, dispossessed them of their lands, until the complete annexation of Hokkaido. Just like the Eskimo populations of Canada, Chukchi of Siberia, the Ainu are animists. It was from 1928 that an ethnographic and scientific interest in this people appeared. In 1933 the young Emperor Hirohito bought statuettes (bears) from artisans. This event brought public attention, and led to the development of workshops; allowing this population to survive. This work is representative of Ainu productions from the 70s-90s: elongation, emerging fluid forms, peaceful subjects.