The Yaka staff (next to a George McNeil painting, Park Avenue: 5 pm) was likely owned by a spiritual practitioner who used it in “ceremonies of transformation,” says Fred Lamp, “to change someone from bad to good, from sick to well—perhaps someone who had been in an accident or whose crops had failed. It was used in solving spiritual problems. But most problems were considered spiritual.” It would have started out with the wooden figure alone on top of the staff, but over the years the practitioner attached fiber, shells, seed pods, and wrappings. Each item attached, like a prescription, had its own spiritual significance.

All photos ©Richard Barnes