Big Stone Head - Easter Island and Pop Culture by James Teitelbaum

Big Stone Head
Easter Island and Pop Culture

The Moai in real life...

Big Stone Head is the new book project by James Teitelbaum. James is the author of Tiki Road Trip (Santa Monica Press, 2003, revised edition due April 2007), as well as shorter works for American Heritage, Beverage World, Playboy.com, AAA World magazine, Alternative Press magazine, RoadTripAmerica.com, ReVue magazine, Blue Harvest magazine, Tiki magazine, and ForcesOfGood, and many others.

As implied in the title, Big Stone Head is an exploration of the strange and wonderful mysteries of Easter Island, focusing on how popular culture has interpreted the island’s unique stone effigies - and the island’s many other enigmas - over the course of the 20th century and beyond.

The stoic visage of the moai (the titular ‘big stone heads’ of Easter Island) have been appropriated for everything from whiskey ads to postage stamps to drinking vessels to cartoons to lawn ornaments. The moai have been the inspiration for countless artists working in sculpture, painting, illustration, mosaic, film, and any other imaginable media. The moai have been the subject of tattoos and street graffiti, of pop songs and movies, of jewelry, or corporate logos, and of cars and bars. Life-sized recreations of the moai appear all over the world: in France, Japan, the United States, Chile, Germany, Spain, Australia, Norway, and elsewhere.

Many academic studies of Easter Island have been published over the past 100 years, and an equal number of silly quack theories about the island have seen print as well. However, none of these works have looked at the most enigmatic spot on the globe from the perspective of its place in popular culture, and the effects that international pop culture’s use of the moai image has had on the islanders, their culture, and their environment. This book is unique. The arguments made in the text of Big Stone Head can apply equally well to many other cultures who have been diluted by well meaning pop culture hipsters and greedy corporate interests alike.

Big Stone Head is written in a style that finds a balance between academia and good fun. It is designed to appeal to those interested in popular culture and so-called “Tiki Style,”, and to those looking for a colorfully illustrated introduction to the island’s history and mysteries, including the outside world’s effect on the islanders and their ancestral creations.

James has visited Easter Island twice to interview the islanders, make photographs, and observe the effects of the outside world on this tiny island first-hand. The writing of Big Stone Head - Easter Island and Pop Culture, has begun; A draft of the text is complete, including at least 300 images scanned and ready for a designer.

At this time, James is looking for a suitable publisher for the project.

Feel free to contact him if you are interested in Big Stone Head.

...and in Pop Culture...

...let us enjoy images of both faces of the Moai while asking the question: what is the cost?

Only in BIG STONE HEAD!

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Last updated on October 15, 2006

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