Harry Clifford Fassett | Woman standing in front of thatched hut belonging to Johnnie Toga, a chief, Neifau village, Vavau Island, Tonga Islands, 1899-1900 | Image and data from National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution

May is the month to celebrate the heritage of Asians and Pacific Islanders in the United States. The cultures, history, religion, architecture, and art of the continent of Asia are well represented in the Artstor Digital Library, and you can find a full guide in our Artstor Is… Asian Studies post; resources for Asian-Pacific content are also plentiful, but scattered throughout many collections and require a little more diligence.

Vanuatu; Malakula Island, Mbotgote | Helmet Mask, 19th-20th century | Image and data from: The Metropolitan Museum of Art | Image © The Metropolitan Museum of Art

A quick way to find content in the Digital Library from a specific country is by going to the Browse area in the lower left corner of the search page and clicking Geography. Considering that Asia-Pacific encompasses the Pacific islands of Melanesia (Fiji, New Caledonia, New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, and Vanuatu), Micronesia (Guam, Kiribati, Marianas, Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, Nauru, Palau, and Wake Island), and Polynesia (American Samoa and Samoa, Cook Islands, Easter Island, French Polynesia, Hawaiian Islands, Midway Island, New Zealand, Rotumas, Tonga, and Tuvalu), this might be a little time consuming, so here are some hints:

The main repositories of Asian-Pacific images in Artstor include the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which features art and artifacts from many of the regions listed above, the Peabody Museum of Natural History (Yale University), which has archaeological and ethnographic objects, the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology (Harvard University), which has anthropological objects, and Magnum Photos, which includes contemporary photographs of New Guinea by Burt Glinn and Philip Jones Griffiths, of the Marshall Islands by Chris Steele-Perkins, Samoa by Alex Webb, the Cook Islands by Trent Parke, and Easter Island by Thomas Hoepker.

Solomon Islands | Kundu players at Mapiri for dukduk dance | Yale University: Peabody Museum of Natural History

Also of note is Cook’s Voyages to the South Seas (Natural History Museum, London), which includes 1,600 images of botanical and zoological illustrations associated with Captain James Cook’s expeditions to the South Pacific in the 18th century, and Thomas K. Seligman: Photographs of Liberia, New Guinea, Melanesia and the Tuareg people which, as its title states, includes field photography of New Guinea and Melanesia. Also fruitful, The Native American Art and Culture (National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution) includes a dozen fascinating photographs of Fiji in 1900 by Charles Haskins Townsend, and the Fowler Museum, the Dallas Museum of Art Collection, the Saint Louis Art Museum, and the Smith College Museum of Artall include art and artifacts from different cultures in Asia Pacific.

Johann Georg Adam Forster | Rufous Night Heron, 1774 | Image and original data provided by Natural History Museum, London

And don’t miss Re-historicizing Contemporary Pacific Island Art by Marion Cadora, a graduate student at the University of Hawaii at Manoa.

Enjoy the celebrations and don’t forget to visit the Library of Congress’ official Asian-Pacific American Heritage Month site!

Polynesian | Easter Island (Rapa Nui); view of unfinished moai statues on slopes of Rano Raraku volcano | 10th-12th cent. | Image and original data provided by Erich Lessing Culture and Fine Arts Archives/ART RESOURCE, N.Y. artres.com / artres.com