Pottery making has existed in Fiji for 3,000 years as part of its cultural tradition, but tourism has changed the production of Fijian pottery. The industry has pushed for styles and designs that appeal to tourists.
Research conducted by Rosa Rossitto, titled “Stylistic Change in Fijian Pottery,” published in Pacific Studies in 1995, suggests a close intertwining between pottery-making and socioeconomic changes.
Fijian women from the kai wai, or “people of the sea,” began making pottery using the paddle and anvil technique. They open-fired their vessels and used gum from the makadre-dakua tree to seal and color the exterior of the pottery.
Rossitto noted that in the early 1800s, pottery was important for household and personal use, trade transactions, as well as social and political connections.
At social gatherings, people bartered their pots for barkcloths, vegetables, mats, and other agricultural products. For ceremonies like births, funerals and marriages, pots were exchanged for valuables, or offered as tributes and gifts to chiefs.
Transactions began to change when the Europeans arrived in Fiji, and people started using money to buy commodities. Potters started making vessels for tourists. The future of the pottery centers and their employees became reliant on the tourism market. More tourists meant more pottery to make and sell, and more people to hire.
Rossitto studied the vessels manufactured in pottery centers in Rewa Province, Yavulo, and lower Sigatoka and Yanuya island at the Fiji Museum collection.
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She noted that the pottery sets produced in Fiji during the pre-historic period were used for cooking yam, taro, meat and vegetables. Other sets were used as drinking vessels, kava bowls and dish servers.
Vessels were shaped and produced according to their designated uses.
For example, cooking pots were usually oval and wide-mouthed, while drinking vessels had different shapes and spouts for easier pouring. Vessels for water storage were larger and had no spouts.
In the past, the forms of traditional Fijian vessels were limited, but the decorations varied.
Rossitto, who conducted eight months of field research in Fiji between 1986 and 1987, pointed out that no two vessels produced in the same area had the same designs and decorations. It's because potters avoided recreating one another's designs. Anyone copying another potter's design would be held in low esteem. There was a type of "copyright" that restrained potters from copying decorations from other potters.
The art of decorating a vessel was not random. Decoration would start in the mind. Potters would think and visualize their designs, factoring in the pottery center's stylistic tradition. Then they would organize the elements needed for the decoration they had in mind.
The potters followed basic procedures for decorating their vessels, employing different decorative techniques. Each potter had individual preferences regarding the decorative tools used to achieve the desired effect.
Rossitto noted that the changes in pottery styles covered several aspects, including the forms, decorations, sizes, lightness and inscriptions on vessel surfaces, among others.
After the Europeans arrived in Fiji, pottery designs were driven by socioeconomic context. Potters became more open to contemporary influences compared to the non-commercial, traditional setting they were used to. They began diversifying the products they offered to buyers, —usually tourists, as well as amateur and professional collectors, — to provide a wider choice and increase their chances of selling more pots, thus earning more money.
Fijian potters also began introducing variations to traditional vessels and imitating those from other areas, a practice that was forbidden in the past.
Rossitto noted that when potters started copying designs from the western islands, it stirred mixed reactions from the pottery centers. Sigatoka Valley accepted the change, while pottery centers in Nasilai and Yanuya resisted it.
Before the arrival of the Europeans, there was little contact between the pottery centers, so potters couldn’t see each other’s designs and styles until the mid-1800s when pacification and extension of Fijian states began.
On a general level, potters now create pottery as souvenirs to remind tourists of their trip to Fiji, adjusting their vessels to meet the demands of the tourism market, such as making lighter miniatures and creating pots with flat bases and stands.
The potters do not get direct contact with tourists, so they rely on the Municipal Handicraft Center of Suva to sell their vessels.
Another change came in 1949 when the Ministry of Forestry declared the dakua tree as "protected." Tapping the dakua tree sap became illegal because it damaged the trees. The potters had nothing to glaze their vessels with, so they began using industrial varnish. Varnish provided the shine but did not produce the shades of color that the potters wanted.
Finding that tourists preferred glazed and decorated vessels, potters started to glaze and decorate traditional plain ware, like cooking pots, as decorative objects.
In the past, potters found it pointless to decorate cooking pots because smoke from continued use would hide the decoration. The traditional elaborate decoration of pots started to disappear.
Today, the age-old tradition of pottery making still lives. Visitors can watch Fijian women demonstrate the meticulous process of traditional pottery making in organized tours to Fijian pottery villages like Nakabuta, Lawai, Sigatoka and others.
Raquel Bagnol is a longtime journalist. She worked as a reporter for Marianas Variety on Saipan and Island Times in Palau. Send feedback to gukdako@yahoo.com
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