Tiki Pop

Tiki Pop explores the development of Tiki as a romantic vision and cultural appropriation, tracing its journey from James Cook's expeditions to Gauguin's paintings and Hollywood jungle fantasies. It features hundreds of images and showcases the figure of Tiki from its earliest beginnings to its downfall.

Format: Hardback
Length: 640 pages
Publication date: 08 April 2022
Publisher: Taschen GmbH

Urban islands and bamboo hideaways set the stage for a pop culture phenomenon like no other. In mid-century America, the imaginative appeal of Tiki penetrated fashion, music, eating, drinking, and architecture. In handy Bibliotheca Universalis format, Tiki Pop traces the development of Tiki as a romantic vision and cultural appropriation. Follow Tiki from James Cook's first Pacific Island expeditions, through Gauguin's exotic paintings, Hollywood jungle fantasies, and elaborate temples erected to celebrate Tiki as the god of recreation. With hundreds of images, Tiki the pop icon unfolds from its earliest, enthusiastic beginnings to its spectacular downfall in the dawning awareness of the Western world's colonial misdeeds. This book is the culmination of the extensive research of Sven Kirsten, urban archaeologist, Tiki sage, and author of earlier TASCHEN investigations, The Book of Tiki and Tiki Modern, which first recovered the figure of Tiki from obscurity. In his widely lauded graphic style, Kirsten places venerable ancient godheads next to their Polynesian pop counterparts, movie posters next to matchboxes, comic strips next to Robinson Crusoe illustrations. The result is at once a visual feast, a piece of cultural history, and a tribute to a very particular vision of paradise.

Weight: 1120g
Dimension: 203 x 152 x 45 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9783836581547
Edition number: Multilingual ed