Elizabeth Pryce, originally a Sydney-based pharmacist, became enthralled with the world of tribal arts. After extensively travelling to Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and throughout the Pacific Islands, Elizabeth amassed a sizeable art collection which eventually caught the eye of Sotheby’s Paris in 2018.
Now, as one of the founding members and vice-president of the Oceanic Art Society in Sydney, I spoke with Elizabeth about how she started her collection, what it takes to become a collector and her love of all things Oceanic Arts.
What was your occupation outside of art collecting?
I was a pharmacist. I worked my whole life as a pharmacist.
What was the catalyst to start collecting tribal arts?
Well, I was always a collector. I didn’t buy Brett Whiteley’s, you know but I bought paintings. I used to love English silver and pottery, so I always had a bit of a bent towards collecting
But I had two friends who lived in Mosman and I used to visit their house on a regular basis and they had a very eclectic collection. I’d look at all the familiar objects, the art, the porcelain, the silver or the bits of sculpture. They used a method I call “space bar” that is, interjecting tribal art between contemporary art to space them out.
People can be a bit confronted with tribal art. They don’t know where to begin. They might find it a bit crude. It’s interesting that in that sense we don’t appreciate the art of our region.
Considering our proximity in Australia, there’s not really enough of it around, is there?
There’s nothing on display in Sydney. Macleay Collections at Sydney University used to have a small display but I don’t think it’s currently operating. The real shocker though is the Australian Museum. It’s only placed in a tiny room even though they do have one of the major Tribal collections. We used to love going down to the Australian Museum and looking at their New Guinea art.
For artists, look at Picasso, look at how inspired he was by African art. He had quite a collection from Vanuatu in his personal collection. In Australia, we don’t value it. Whereas the French do, the Germans do – the British not so much.
How did you familiarise yourself with art and collecting?
I was so passionate about it that I would travel to see exhibitions. If I was going to Germany, I would be going to Berlin because they would have a marvellous Sepik exhibition on. I have to say museum directors in Europe, without exception, are extremely generous. When I went to Berlin the first time, they were renovating the entire gallery, but the director took me down and showed me everything they had in storage. I had developed this huge database of images – because the only way you learn is to look at things, look at objects.
I travelled with a purpose. There were always these exhibitions involved in a holiday somewhere.
You were developing your eye and going to all these museums with tribal art, it does almost seem like you have to be an amateur anthropologist to grasp the understanding behind each piece?
You do. You have to make a study of it. I still have a library. That’s your reference library. You can’t go down to the council library and say “I’d like to borrow Douglas Newton’s ‘Art Styles of the Papuan Gulf.” The librarian would look at you like you’re from Mars.
It’s been a marvellous journey for me thatculminated in selling my collection in Paris. That was just fortunate. Every year in Paris, they have a tribal art fair. All these dealers come into Paris for a week to exhibit their wares. People come from all over the world to see the art. Including David Attenborough, who I’ve seen on at least two occasions. The last time I saw him was in 2018. He loves it. He has a private collection too.
There’s a naturalist element to it that he must like?
There is. You see, all the things are made with what’s available. The original pieces were covered with ochres, not acrylic paints. Or when the missionaries came into the islands with a thing called ‘bluebag’ – it was a thing that women used when they were washing their white sheets to make them whiter. It was like a big block of chalk. Anyways, the locals got their hands on the ‘bluebags’ and they used to colour some of their sculptures with that, which to them was terribly exciting.
At the height of your collection, how many pieces did you have?
I had a sale at Theodore Bruce in Australia after the sale at Sotheby’s Paris, which included a lot of Indonesian tribal art too. A lot of that was sold here in Sydney.
I probably had about 300-350 pieces.
Was it hard to say goodbye to them when you decided to sell?
Yes, it was initially. But once I’d made the decision, I was firm. I really wanted to move out of my house and move into an apartment. So, I just knew I couldn’t possibly do that with the collection. I knew I had to be sensible and disperse it.
Who did the Sotheby’s Paris sale appeal to?
The sale I had in Paris was slightly different from the regular Sotheby’s sales – in that it was aimed at people in the 20’s or 30’s, who maybe couldn’t afford to buy a piece at a Sotheby’s sale that normally could be around 50,000 euros. So they could buy something in my sale for around 2,000 – 5,000 euros. There was a lot of small items in my sale, which means they could get a toe hold on the collecting ladder.
What was the motivation to start the Oceanic Art Society?
A group of us got together and formed the Oceanic Art Society with the main aim of encouraging the Australian museums to show some of these collections. There was a small exhibition, under Kim Mackay (Director & CEO of the Australian Museum). Her aim was to build another building and house the Pacific collection in that. I would say there’s smaller chances of that happening at the moment.
But this group was somewhat older. I can’t see the Oceanic Art Society going on with the millennials.
There is a definite shift in the attention of millennials?
Yes, technology has certainly grabbed a huge amount of their attention.
The French are unique in the fact that they’re so interested in Tribal Art. They have a whole museum, Musée du quai Branly, dedicated to it. Whereas the British system has always been to combine a natural history museum, which is what the Australian Museum largely is, and in one corner you put a bit of Tribal Art. That’s if you’re lucky. Germans and the French, particularly, have celebrated it. The Americans too to some extent, they have quite a few museums dedicated to the arts of other cultures.
I was so passionate at the time that I couldn’t believe that everybody couldn’t see how wonderful it was.
For someone who might want to start wanting collecting, how much were you initially investing in art? Did you have a strategy behind wanting to amass a collection of a certain size or was it just an ongoing hobby?
It was just an ongoing hobby. At first I did what most people do – I bought utter rubbish. A friend later said to me, ‘you pay for your education.’ I bought things that reallywere firewood. I went to an auction house, Lawson’s, after work and I’d always whip up there for the sales. In those days, when there wasn’t a huge number of people interested in it, you could buy things relatively cheaply.But I got to a point where I realised, it’s better to buy less and buy better things.
When I refined my eye by just travelling and going to museums, I then realised some of the things I had were grossly inferior. So, I proceeded to weed those out by putting them up for auction and with those proceeds, I would buy a better piece.
In those days, 30–40 years ago, you could buy pieces in this country for a much more reasonable price than you could ever buy them in Europe.
It’s an interesting strategy. It seems a lot of younger people don’t realise there are actually opportunities in these auction houses.
Yes, yes. It’s harder and harder in Australia now to find quality stuff at a very cheap price because there are more dealers. But there were very few dealers when I started out. Even so, it’s a niche market and the people who are really interested right now – some of them are older and they might beat the younger person because they’ve got deeper pockets.
But still, there definitely are opportunities. If you collected tribal art, you’ve got a chance because it’s not so expensive. Whereas if you decided to collect well-known artists, of course you have to have deeper pockets.
Is there something you tend to look for in pieces?
Well I want to get pieces of genuine age. I didn’t buy any contemporary – but there is quite good contemporary Pacific art. Personally, I bought older pieces, mostly prior to 1950.
What you’d love to get is a collection of late 19th century, early 20th century. So occasionally you could get something genuinely old and beautiful – like lime spatulas, they were something that were attainable from the Massim, in the Trobriand islands. You could get a beautiful Massim lime spatula for a reasonable amount of money…and it would have to have a nice patina, because if it was a genuine piece that had been handled and handled by the people, it would have to have a lovely patina.
Would you have any advice just starting out on a collection?
I would say, go and have a look at the small room in the Australian museum. Get some really good books. Look at previous catalogues from the big auction houses like Christie’s and Sotheby’s. Go online and try to buy catalogues. Educate your eye! Because that is the thing you’ve got to do. I can remember asking these friends of mine who got me interested, “How can you tell it’s old?!” I was utterly intrigued initially. Of course, when you educate your eye, you can tell pretty quickly.
Are there a lot of women collecting Tribal art?
It’s not very common for women to get into collecting Tribal art. Helena Rubinstein, the cosmetic businesswoman, had a major collection. Most women don’t like it but it’s a tremendous bridge into understanding contemporary art.
