Polynesia, from the Greek for “many islands,” covers more than a thousand islands in the triangle roughly formed by the Hawaiian Islands, Easter Island, and New Zealand.

Visual expressions of genealogy, power, and spirituality are seen in various motifs and designs across a variety of objects, including instruments, jewelry, weaponry, figures, and textiles.

Micronesia, “tiny islands,” consists of over 2,000 islands together composing a land area about the size of Rhode Island, spread over about three million square miles of ocean, with fewer than a hundred of them large and fertile enough for human habitation. Not as abundant as in either Polynesia or Melanesia, the visual arts tend to be simple in form and regular in design.