Pacific Arts: The Journal of the Pacific Arts Association

Atalilo: Motifs in Sāmoan Material Culture (2024–27) is the first exhibition staged in the newly established Ōfaga o Saʻliʻiliga National University of Sāmoa Research Museum. The exhibition explores the myriad uses of motifs across six genres of Sāmoan material culture: tatau (tattooing), afa (sennit lashing), ʻele (pottery), maʻa (petroglyphs), laʻau (wood carvings), and siapo (barkcloth). While displays of each genre had its own challenges in presentation, design, and curation, the most complex was the section on siapo. This article begins with an introduction to siapo’s cultural and historical significance and its contemporary production and use. It then outlines emerging institutional and cultural ironies in attempting to display nineteenth-century siapo in contemporary Sāmoa—issues that prompt deeper questions about the urgent need to recognize and support both the living and ephemeral dimensions of Sāmoan heritage.