PRESERVATION OF BRAZILIAN INDIGENOUS ART
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Figure 3 Monkey Bench by Kamalurré Mehinako
Note. The bench was sculpted in 2000 and is a part of the private BEI Collection. Pottery is also considered a traditional art of indigenous communities in Brazil. In particular, those of the Waurá are functional objects such as pots and pans, while the Iny-Karajá pottery is marked by their representation of animals and Ritxoko dolls. Waurá pans are classified into five categories: kamalupo, makura, héjé, tsaktsak and zoomorphic (Alves and Rauber, 2019). The Waurá mastery of pottery comes from a myth of Kamalu Hai, a snake that defecated large amounts of clay in the Batovi River, and gave the Waurá peoples exclusive knowledge on how to use it to make pottery. As noted in the study by Alves et. al, 2019, the Waurá have approximately 45 graphic motifs used in pottery, 13 of which can be observed in Figure 4. These motifs were created from observing their surroundings, and each have a meaning. Made from clay and wax, the Ritxoko dolls represent daily Iny-Karajá life and their traditions but also symbolize the imaginary (Grassi Museum, 2018). Figure 5 shows an example of Karajá Ritxoko dolls.
