Found object | ||
| Folk Art30 of 2507 |  |  |
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Posted 2 years ago
Contessa57
(1 item)
10”x4”
Porous material
Bone?
Given to me by a neighbor who is moving from a house to small apartment. She said she acquired it in Hawaii but I haven’t had any luck with a search of Hawaiian pieces.
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Whale bone is extremely porus. Try whale bone Hawaii as a search
It's a souvenir figure called a "Billikan," usually credited to an Anglo woman from the U.S. who "dreamed" about the figure, and sold the copyrighted idea to a company. It became widely known as a '"good luck" charm in the first half of the 1900s, which enjoyed world-wide popularity.
Sports teams adopted the image or name; the Alaska–Yukon–Pacific Exposition of 1909 sold souvenirs carved from ivory by Alaskan natives; songs, movies, and books featured the Billikan; and it was widely copied by artisans, companies, and others...so this could have been found anywhere in the world. It has no basis in any tribal tradition, however, Hawaiian, Alaskan, Japanese, or otherwise.
The material appears to be bone, since it is less dense than ivory and lacks the characteristic Schreger lines found on ivory. Here's a good website from the Canadian CCI, which explains how to tell the difference between bone, ivory, whale or walrus tusk, and antler: https://tinyurl.com/2p9hpfda
Keep it for good luck!