I decided to look at “Bird Pendant” from the Ancient American Art collection at the MET. Upon clicking on it, the first amount of information that was offered was some history about the object and where exactly it came from. It came from Costa Rica and is made of jadeite. There is also speculation that the object is from the Atlantic Watershed Region, and that the style and the pendant is in is consistent with other pre-Columbian Costa Rican art. The overview includes the title (Bird Pendent), date (4th-7th Century), geography (Costa Rica, Central Region), culture (Central Region), medium (Jadeite), dimensions (H. 2 5/8 x W. 3/4 x D. 1 7/8 in. (6.7 x 1.9 x 4.7 cm)), classifications (Stone-Ornaments, Jade), credit line (The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Bequest of Nelson A. Rockefeller, 1979), and accession number (1979.206.1138). The provenance section is listed as such, [Andre Emmerich Gallery, New York, until 1965]; Nelson A. Rockefeller, New York, 1965, on loan to the Museum of Primitive Art, New York, 1965–1978. There is also a exhibition history, of the time that the object was on display in an exhibition, which were; September 30, 1970–January 3, 1971, September 16, 1998–February 28, 1999, and December 16, 2019–June 27, 2021. Through all my looking (and I might just not looked in the right spot) but I couldn’t find information regarding the acquisition of the object, condition reports, or conservation treatments. Maybe this object doesn’t need much management, but I still find it odd that in the section about the details, there isn’t any mention of how the museum got it.
For my own personal item, I chose a shark tooth necklace. The item consists of a shark from an unknown type of shark, some wire, and a tied piece of leather. The date of it is modern 21st Century, culture is unknown, but the leather was hand treated and the necklace was made in the Florida region. I guess the provenance would be a gift from my uncle to me, and it is currently in Fairbanks, Alaska. The dimensions of the shark tooth are roughly 1.1cm W and 1.9cm L.
Question: Was there an item that you wanted to write about, but there wasn’t any information about it?
