Standing almost six feet high, this commanding and monumental male figure representing a powerful clan hero is the only existing figure of its quality, size, and type in the United States and only one of just a handful of similar figures throughout the world. At one time, it served as a protective guardian for a family group of the Biwat residing along the Yuat River in Papua New Guinea. In Biwat communities, these powerful spirit figures, often linked by oral tradition to spirits active in the forest or in garden clearings, aided hunters and gatherers for generations. They were adorned, revered, and worshipped in the intimate dwelling spaces of families or in ceremonial houses.Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, de Young 125 (California: Cameron + Company, 2021), p. 89, entry by Christina Hellmich.