Being a dealer in Oceanic Art allows me to constantly add new pieces to the collection, to explore new sources, to develop my knowledge and refine my eye. Those works of art, which are sold, remain in my memory and I enjoy them with true pleasure in the collections of their new owners. Often I manage to buy them back after several years, only to sell them on again to another amateur. This is the life of the objet - I am only the temporary guardian of the piece before it is transmitted to the following owner.

The intense pleasure of a newly acquired objet carries me onwards towards the horizons of observation, research, and comparison; a feverish and fascinating job. After the initial rush of the acquisition I begin the research. I open books, which I have not looked at for several months and the volumes pile up on the desk open to interesting pages. I photograph the piece from all angles, and gradually I take in its force, the plastic expression, the patina and the material, the myth of ancestor, the power that it contains and the power that it gives me. Why did the artist use this or that color, what was the function of the object, whom did it represent, how was it used, and of course what village, what tribe, what island group did it come from, when was it collected, by whom, and where did it go from there and finally how did it finally come to me? And this never stops; sometimes the information or the inspired understanding comes to me only months or years later.

And then the process starts again for there is always another piece on the horizon, just waiting to be swept up!

Anthony JP Meyer