8 



PRIMITIVE ART 



appear attached to the eyebrows or to other parts of the body; 

 the raven, by its long beak ; the sea-monster, by its large head and 

 by flippers attached to its elbows. 



The method of distorting the 

 animal form in order to make it 

 fit the decorative field is illus- 

 trated in the specimens in Case 

 C 13. The decorated wooden 

 dish in the bottom of the case 

 represents an animal. It is so 

 shown that the front of the dish 

 represents the animal's head; 

 the sides of the dish, the sides of 

 the body ; while the narrow end 

 in the rear represents the tail. 

 Thus it will be seen that the dish 

 actually represents the body of the animal hollowed out from the 

 back. The animal forms are placed in a similar manner on painted 

 hats, as on the one here illustrated ; the whole animal being laid 

 around the conical hat, and, as it were, being pulled over the head. 

 In some cases the adaptations require material changes in the form 

 of the animal. When, for instance, a fish is to be painted or car\'ed 

 on the front of a square box, the body of the fish must be so dis- 

 torted as to fill as nearly as possible the whole decorative field. This 

 is done by cutting 



the fish along its 1/;=^ ^ — -^^^T'''^:: — S* t ^ U' 



whole back from 

 head to tail, by 

 exaggerating the 

 size of the head, 

 twisting half of 

 the body along 

 each side of the 

 decorative field 

 and placing the 

 tail so that its 

 end comes just under the head. In still other cases the form of the 

 decorative field necessitates great reduction in the size of certain 



