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Dr Steven Hooper, Project Leader
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Dr Helen Southward, Research Assistant, Oct 2003 - Dec 2004
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Dr Karen Jacobs, Research Assistant, from Jan 2005 onwards
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Ms Maia Jessop, Research Student
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Ms Julie Martin, Secretarial Support
The Polynesian Visual Arts project, based at the Sainsbury Research Unit for the Arts of Africa, Oceania and the Americas at the University of East Anglia, received an AHRC Research Grant of £220,897 for a three-year period from 2003 to 2006.
This unique project brought together objects and documents from the 1760s to the mid nineteenth century. This was a time of tremendous change for the indigenous Polynesian communities, as they encountered Europeans, including Captain Cook, and developed strategies to deal with them, which included exchanging valuable objects for European metal, cloth and muskets. A wealth of material from this period survives in British museums and collections, including objects, pictures and written accounts. The project amassed a growing register of over 1,300 artefacts from various surviving collections.
The project also studied archives, in particular the publications of the 
London Missionary Society. Documents revealed information on religious practices, objects, their collection and use in display. There was also an extensive fieldwork throughout Polynesia. This work was disseminated through a series of workshops, symposia and conferences, journal articles and a book, as well as two major exhibitions:
Pacific Encounters: Art & Divinity in Polynesia 1760-1860. Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, Norwich, 21 May-13 August 2006.
This exhibition presented the largest collection of Polynesian artefacts ever brought together. It was complemented by an education programme of school visits and workshops for children and young people, plus a series of lectures, talks and other associated events. This exhibition received 21,000 visitors.
Power & Taboo: Sacred Objects from the Pacific. British Museum, London, 28 September 2006 - 7 January 2007.
This exhibition received 120,000 visitors.
Economic Impact
- £8.1 millions for the UK economy; including
- £3.9 millions for the London economy; and
- £270, 000 for the Norwich regional economy
Further Outcomes
Pacific Encounters will be restaged at the new Musee du Quali Branly in Paris during Summer 2008. The museum is the largest of its kind in the world. The exhibition will be shown at the height of the tourist season with likely visitor figures of over 100,000.
The book, Pacific Encounters (2006) was jointly published by the British Museum Press, The University of Hawaii Press and the National Museum of New Zealand. There will be a French edition in 2008.
Further details on the work of the Polynesian Visual Arts project are available from its website.
PricewaterhouseCoopers calculated gross visitor expenditure by examining how far visitors travelled to visit the exhibition and their motivations for travelling (i.e. whether the exhibition was the main reason for their travel). The UK Tourism Survey was used to estimate average daily and overnight visitor spending. Taking into account deadweight and displacement factors, a net economic impact was calculated. A multiplier was added to ensure that secondary impacts on the local economy were included in the overall calculation. Multipliers: 1.32 for the Norwich region, 1.44 for London, and 1.56 for the UK.