About the gallery

Tambaran is one of New York City’s oldest Tribal Art galleries specializing in exceptionally beautiful museum quality pieces. Founded in 1979 by Maureen Zarember, the gallery offers an unrivaled expertise in African, Oceanic and North-West Coast American art to private collectors and museums all over the world.

Zarember’s eye for authenticity, condition and aesthetic are well established in the tribal art market where she has been helping clients build collections for over thirty years. With a gallery open to the public, she also welcomes young collectors, first time buyers and students.

Tambaran’s objects have been exhibited and sold to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Linden Museum in Stuttgart Germany, the Royal Academy of Arts London, the Royal Academy of Arts Berlin, the Museum of African Art, Smith College Museum of Art, the Heye Foundation of Art, the Minjie Museum in California, the Detroit Institute Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts Houston, the Neuberger Museum of Art, the National Gallery in Canberra Australia, the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art and Le Museé de quai Branly.

Tambaran’s art has been featured in Vogue, Vanity Fair, Harper’s BAZAAR and the Estee Lauder “Primitive Worlds” Advertising Campaign.

A number of major collections and auction houses have chosen Tambaran as a venue for their masterworks. Examples include the French collection of Hubert Goldet, the Geiger Collection of Pre-Columbian Art and the Pierre & Claude Verité collection.

Maureen Zarember bio

Born in Australia, Zarember received an early introduction to Aboriginal and Oceanic art as a child in Australia by frequenting the National Gallery in Canberra and the Victoria museum in Melbourne. In the early 1960’s and 1970’s her travels to the South Pacific cemented a life-long passion for tribal art. She was introduced to African and North-West Coast American art by Gustave Shindler, Gaston de Havenon and Ted Carpenter.

On one my early trips Papua New Guinea I was forbidden to enter a House Tambaran because I was a young woman. Only initiated men could enter because that’s where cult objects were stored. As I backed away I uttered the Australian expression ‘no worries no worries’ and added ‘I’ll have my own House Tambaran one day’  - Maureen