Allure of the Pacific Mona Lisa

Te Papa's version of Poedua is considered by experts to be an important addition to our collections. Photo / Supplied

There is a fascinating backstory to how John Webber, the artist on Captain James Cook's third Pacific voyage, came to paint the young Tahitian princess, Poetua.

Described by experts as exotic and erotic, it depicts the daughter of Oreo, chief of one of the Society Isles, the biggest island of which is Tahiti.

She looks beautiful, relaxed, benign. Which probably mean it is no documentary piece, unless Poedua (the spelling, regarded as incorrect, used by Webber for the painting) was a most willing prisoner.

Cook had a problem. Two sailors from accompanying ship the Discovery, captained by Lieutenant Charles Clerke, had deserted.

It is thought the crew would have known this was Cook's last journey to the Pacific - it took place between 1776 and 1780 - and so a final opportunity to escape to a paradise of warm weather, abundant food, available sex and freedom from the restrictive class structure of home.

Cook, who knew Poedua from a visit on his second voyage, took the young princess hostage, along with her father and brother, to trade for the sailors. The trio were locked in Clerke's tiny cabin for several days until the Tahitians delivered the sailors back to their ship.

Webber took the chance to make sketches from which the three paintings were later produced over several years, although it has been said that he also made a small oil painting, now lost, while she was captive.

Te Papa describes the painting as "one of the most significant historic artworks" in the gallery's collection and acting CEO Michelle Hippolite notes that it adds another dimension to two other Webbers the gallery owns - Ship Cove, bought in 1991 for $300,000, and a portrait of Cook - plus a Hawaiian cloak and helmet and flora and fauna collected by Joseph Banks, all from Cook's voyages.

"We thought the acquisition would make a great contribution to [help us] understand more about Captain Cook's time here in the Pacific."

Spending so much was, however, a big decision when one or other of the other versions could have been borrowed for display here. Hippolite acknowledges that the cost "means other [unspecified Te Papa] programmes will be slowed down a bit".

Consensus among art experts the Herald consulted is that Te Papa should be applauded for its pursuit and purchase of Poedua.

"The thing is, that from the 18th century there are very few paintings of specific people. This is a single figure and they know who the person was and the circumstances," says Ron Brownson, senior curator at the Auckland Art Gallery.

"It's not as though New Zealand has many 18th century paintings out of the Pacific or New Zealand.

"Different commentators have said this painting is a mixture of exoticism and eroticism. There [are] not 30 examples from the 18th century of Pacific images like that. This is something we should feel very proud of."

Brownson has seen the versions in galleries in Canberra and London and he says Te Papa's is every bit as good. "I believe that when people see it they are not going to be disappointed. It is a beautiful painting."

Opportunities to buy such historic paintings are rare. The Webber painting in London's National Maritime Museum, for instance, has been owned by the British people since it was painted. The same goes for much of the work of William Hodges, who accompanied Cook on his second voyage to the Pacific.

"It is a coup, absolutely," says Brownson. "This was a rare moment where an 18th century Pacific work, a portrait, could be made available."

In the 1950s the Government missed out on acquiring as a gift the collection of expatriate New Zealander Rex Nan Kivell, an art dealer based in London. His private collection was a treasure trove of 1600 drawings and paintings, 3000 prints plus maps, books, manuscripts and artefacts which covered all three Cook voyages, as well as other pre-1840 New Zealand material.

That, points out art historian Hamish Keith, is all now in the national collections of Australia, including the version of Poedua in Canberra. In fact, most of the images of our earliest European contacts are in either Australian or British museums.

That, along with the rarity of opportunity, are reasons why Keith describes Poedua as "a marvellous acquisition to the national collections".

"Along with the two other Webbers the gallery owns we now have at least a glimpse of Cook's third and fatal voyage. Works of this period in private hands are few, so the chance to acquire one is close to miraculous."

As for cost: "With works as important to our history as this, price is meaningless and its provenance suggests that this might be the original version." (Art historian Bernard Smith has suggested the version in London is the original.)

Keith adds that he thinks Webber was one of the better of Cook's various painters and rates his Cook portrait "the most honest there is".

The portrayal of Poedua may be a case of realism and metaphor. She wears the ivory tapa Tahiti was known for - samples of which Cook took home. Webber shows tatau - the traditional Tahitian tattooing - on her arms most clearly in Te Papa's version, and she is holding a fly whisk, a sign of nobility. And there is sex appeal.

"A winsome dark-eyed light-skinned beauty with a shy smile, " Margaret Jolly writes of Poedua in a recent book about sexuality and Cook's voyages, while Harriet Guest suggests the representation of Pacific females represented "libidinous abandon" against the European middle-class values of restraint.

Te Papa's Poedua, it is suggested, represents all that the Europeans found alluring about Tahiti.

"I think it is an erotic painting," says Brownson. "And isn't that wonderful, that New Zealand can acquire something that is so important historically and is very directly giving an 18th century perspective of desire."

The painting is very important for the Pacific says Victoria University art history lecturer Roger Blackley. "The delights of Tahiti were legendary for the seaman who had been deprived of decent food and female company. Tahiti had this amazing reputation as a place of free love and ... the painting captures that whole mystique."

New Zealand's colonial history is bound up in Cook's voyages and if the country wants a representation of that and sees itself as an important part of Polynesia, then Blackley suggests buying Poedua was a good idea.

The painting is to go on display at Te Papa for a short time before undergoing conservation work expected to take several months.