Mouse Woman drawing by Luke J. Parnell
The Beat
A monthly newsletter about the art of
First Nations on Canada’s West Coast
Welcome to the twentieth issue of The Beat, a free, independent newsletter that brings you up-to-date on the art events of the First Nations on Canada’s Pacific Coast.
We respectfully acknowledge the Coast Salish Peoples, on whose traditional territories we live and work, and all the First Nations of the Pacific coast.
Peace and goodwill to you all in 2009!
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Haida artist Jim Hart, Chief Edenshaw, has completed the final element to surmount the Celebration of Bill Reid Pole in the Bill Reid Gallery of Northwest Coast Art in Vancouver. A tall black raven with a haunting face of a man on its black chest brings the fine pole to life.
See http://www.billreidgallery.ca for more gallery information.
Victoria-based Tahltan artist Peter Morin is one of a group of five Canadian artists “living and working in different corners of the world, who will use the medium of the internet to engage in visual dialogues” in an online art exhibition. REPLYall is hosted by Toronto’s Art Metropole contemporary art centre and gallery.
It can be followed as it evolves online between May 1 and June 11 2009 at http://www.replyall.ca
Peter Morin has another larger new art performance project: 12 Making-Objects: 12 Indigenous Interventions A.K.A. First Nations Dada. The unifying theme: the 12 objects represent conversations he has been having with community members about the Residential School, and the different layers of meaning that are tied to what happened at the Residential School. He further explains: “The making of these 12 objects is my attempt to understand and transform the collective grief we carry as a result of the Residential Schools. A part of this process involves conversation and interaction between me, you as witness, and the land and history.”
The performances will take place in Victoria during May and June. Events are listed at http://www.openspace.ca/web/item/556
One example: currently until May 15, the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria is exhibiting button blankets that were created by young people in a First Nations art class at Victoria High School. The official opening at the AGGV is on May 7. See http://aggv.bc.ca
Artists Peter Morin and Sabrina Williams mentored these students as they made gifts for special people in their lives. The gift-giving will take place at a ceremony on June 21 2009. Twelve blankets were completed, using more than 4000 buttons!
This project for young people is
part of a larger First Nations event on June 21, “A Blanket for the
Earth”, to be held at Surrounded by Cedars Child and Family
Services. The same high school art class is making a special button
blanket for the earth, as a symbolic healing act.
Another event in
the 12
Making Objects
series: on Saturday May 16 at 2 pm at Open Space, 510 Fort Street in
Victoria, a fun event called Making
Bannock will be held at
510 Fort Street in Victoria.
A cookbook called Bannockology, a compendium of bannock knowledge and recipes, edited by Peter Morin, will be sold to raise funds for a children's program.
Some of the events for the Cultural Olympiad for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Games in Vancouver were announced on April 29. Included in the list is Beyond Eden, a musical play based on the 1957 expedition of a team from Vancouver’s Museum of Anthropology to an abandoned village on the Haida Gwaii (Queen Charlotte Islands) in northern British Columbia. The village is Skungwai (also called Ninstints), at the southern tip of the islands. The UBC team had arranged with the council at the Haida town of Skedans to move the old carved poles on the site to the Museum in Vancouver. The play’s fictional lead characters closely resemble the actual expedition members: anthropologist Wilson Duff, and Bill Reid who later became renowned as a Haida artist. Canadian composer Bruce Ruddell began work on the music in 1984; the project has grown over the decades, and has involved consultation with Haida representatives Derek and Gwaii Edenshaw. Canadian musician John Mann of the band Spirit of the West will star in the production, which will be performed at the Vancouver Playhouse from January 16 to February 6 2010. Tickets are on sale from August 17 2009. Phone 604 873 3311. Performances in Calgary follow, from February 16 to March 7 2010.
Two plays about aboriginal culture by First Nations writers are at the Firehall Arts Centre theatre in Vancouver in May: Ernestine Shuswap Gets Her Trout by Tomson Highway is playing at the Firehall Arts Centre theatre until May 9, and Teach Me the Ways of the Sacred Circle by Tsimshian broadcaster Valerie Dudoward on May 16 and 17 2009. The subject of Ernestine Shuswap is the visit by Prime Minister Wilfred Laurier to Kamloops in 1909; in the background of the action is the sinister and unlawful appropriation of First Nations resources and land by the local white settlers. Teach Me the Ways by the late Valerie Dudoward is a fundraiser for Aboriginal Youth Bursaries and survivors of Battered Women Syndrome, and includes a reception and refreshments. The play “explores First Nations cultural values and philosophies and examines them in an urban setting which sometimes obscures or challenges ancient teachings”. See http://www.firehallartscentre.ca
Cruise BC and the BC Port Authority commissioned Nisga’a artist Michael Dangeli and the Git Hayetsk Dancers to perform at the annual Seatrade Cruise Shipping convention in Miami in March 2009. Two masks Ancestral Gift and a Raven were also commissioned for the event. Other Git Hayetsk dance engagements have been at the UBC First Nations Law Clinic Open House and the Florence Nightingale Elementary School. Michael Dangeli, Cree artist Jerry Whitehead and Haida Eric Parnell have been commissioned by the Vancouver Native Housing Society to create works for the Society’s Elders residence. Each artist is creating three individual works and then collaborating on a 7 x 4 ft. painting on canvas.
Sotheby’s New York is holding its annual auction of American Indian Art on May 20 2009. The catalogue contains some remarkable works from the Pacific Northwest coast. Some are from the noted collection of the late Frieda and Milton Rosenthal, others from equally well-known collections, such as those of Morton and Estelle Soslund of Kansas City, and Herbert G. Wellington.
A large and elaborate Kwakwaka’wakw Sun Mask “in the style of Charlie James” has an estimate of US$150-250,000. Charlie James carved two 1914 poles for Vancouver’s Stanley Park; modern replicas of the original poles still stand near Lumberman’s Arch there. A Tsimshian Feast Bowl with a human figure, and a bear’s head, with faint traces of paint, is estimated to sell at US$30-40,000. An exceptional Tsimshian headpiece depicts a very animated bear crouched with head raised, and is estimated at US$175-225,000. A small carved argillite dish by Haida artist Robert Davidson is estimated at US$7-10,000.
The last lot, an “Early Haida Polychrome Wood Mask” of a human face, estimated at US$100-150,000, is from a private collection in England, and unusually sensitive and lifelike. Can we hope to see some of these items find a home back in Canadian cultural centres?
To enjoy the wide range of objects, see http://sothebys.com
The next Inuit and Northwest Coast Art Auction by Appleton Galleries will be held on Sunday May 3 at 1 pm in the Floral Hall of Vancouver’s VanDusen Botanical Garden at 5251 Oak Street at 37th Avenue. Viewing starts at 11 am.
Appleton Galleries at 1451 Hornby Street in downtown Vancouver is open 8 am to 1 pm Monday to Friday.
http://www.appletongalleries.com/
Bonhams & Butterfield will be holding its Native American Art art auction in San Francisco on Monday, June 1 2009. http://bonhams.com
The Res: People and Places is an exhibition by Skokomish artist Denny Sparr Hurtado of photographs which show “the reality of American Indian life” and documents the everyday existence, the reservations, the pow-wows, and historic meetings. It runs until June 27 2009, at the Washington State History Museum in Tacoma Washington. More at http://washingtonhistory.org
Congratulations to the nineteen graduates of Vancouver’s Native Education College’s Northwest Coast Jewellery Arts program. They are exhibiting their work in a show at the Lattimer Gallery in Vancouver: Contemporary Coastal Reflections II, from May 23 to June 13 2009. The Lattimer Gallery is at 1590 West 2nd Avenue. The opening reception is on Saturday the 23rd from 4 to 7 pm. A catalogue accompanies the show. See http://lattimergallery.com
The Coordinator/Instructor of the program, and also its founder, Kwakwaka’wakw artist Dan Wallace says that the Native Education College is now receiving applications from First Nations students for the next seven-month jewellery program which begins in the Fall of 2009. Credits are given to graduates of this program for transfer to the BFA degree at Emily Carr University of Art + Design.
http://www.necvancouver.org/northwest-coast-jewellery-arts-program
Artists of the North: In Honour of Our Ancestors was the title of the exhibition held in April which showcased the work of 22 students of the Frieda Diesing School of Northwest Coast Art of the Northwest Community College’s campus in Terrace BC. Senior students and staff will be exhibiting at Northern Exposure III at the Spirit Wrestler Gallery in Vancouver beginning on May 30 2009.
The Frieda Diesing School longhouse Waap Galts’ap mentioned in The Beat April 2009 is underway, as students and volunteers prepare the logs for the contractors. It will be a beautiful building: planning and work will begin this summer on four carved house posts and a painted panel inside the longhouse. Outside, there will be a painted housefront, and poles will flank the main entrance.
Mique’l Icesis Askren
is the art curator and historian for Metlakatla, Alaska, the
Tsimshian community where she was born and raised. Metlakatla is a
village on the Annette Island Indian Reservation, the only Indian
Reserve in Alaska. Mique’l is currently a Doctoral student in art
history at the University of British Columbia.
For the past five years, she has
curated the Healing Art Exhibit. Located within the
community's new medical center, the Annette Island Service Unit,
this exhibit promotes understanding of the integral connection
between the community's health and its cultural traditions. It
includes over 60 pieces of Tsimshian art produced from 1920 to today
including masks, button robes, woven hats, model canoes,
paddles, prints, bentwood boxes, silver jewelry, model totem poles,
carved panels, a Raven's tail robe, and two full size totem
poles. As a part of the Healing Art Exhibit, Mique’l curated
an exhibit of historical photographs of Metlakatla from 1887-1940. It
was the first official exhibit opening in her community’s history.
Over 300 people attended the event! The exhibit and Miquel’s
approach to conducting research on Metlakatla's history are
part of an article "Looking to the Past to Inspire Our Future:
Strengthening Native Communities through Historical Photograph
Research," in the book Visual
Sovereignty
edited by Veronica Passalacqua & Hulleah
Tsinhnahjinnie, to be released by University of Washington Press this
year.
Recently, Metlakatla Indian Community (MIC)
extended Miquel’s curatorial responsibilities to include the
Duncan Cottage Museum.
William Duncan (1832-1918) was an Anglican missionary who worked
among the Tsimshian of BC and Alaska for sixty-one years.
The six-room cottage, built in 1891 for Duncan, was in a state of
extreme disrepair and had to be closed. The museum’s collection
consists of the personal belongings and tools of Duncan, who was its
sole resident. Duncan dedicated each room of the house to a facet of
his work: he was Metlakatla’s business manager, primary school
teacher, music director, and health care practitioner. Upon his death
in 1918, Duncan’s cottage became a “museum”: everything was
left in place including even his clothes, shoes, bedding, and water
basin. It has remained virtually unchanged since that time. The
Cottage Museum was designated a National Historic Site in 1972.
Mique’l says: “The collection itself has not been completely cataloged and no formal conservation efforts were ever undertaken. Due to numerous changes in staff after its original curator Laverne Wellcome retired in 1997, even the records that did exist in the museum were nearly all destroyed. This past February, Genelle Winter, Director of Landscape for MIC, and I worked with the Alaska State Museum to have their outreach conservator, Scott Carrlee, perform an assessment of the Museum and its collection. He reported that the museum needs a complete overhaul before it can be re-opened to the public. I am currently applying for grants to address the needs of the collection first, and then the building second. For the majority of people in our community, it is not a comfortable place to visit because of the still strong animosity that exists towards Duncan. My overall objective is to change this space so that it reflects our community today, our history, and the strength of our cultural traditions. My focus is to reclaim our presence in the history that this building represents, and transform this once oppressive space into one where our people can gather and feel empowered.”
On May 14 2009, at 7 pm, at the Burke Museum in Seattle, Lynda V. Mapes is speaking about her new book Breaking Ground: The Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe and the Unearthing of Tse-whit-zen Village. In 2003 work was begun on a huge dry-dock project in Port Angeles Washington, a small waterfront city facing Victoria across the Juan de Fuca Strait. A backhoe unearthed the site of one of the largest and oldest Indian village sites ever found in the region. Undeterred, the state continued its project, disturbing hundreds of burials and destroying archaeological evidence of a civilization. Just the initial construction unearthed more than 10,000 artifacts of the village homeland of the Lower Elwha Klallam people. Finally the tribal members succeeded in stopping the work. The Lower Elwha Klallam tribe chair Frances Charles asked the state of Washington to cease work permanently on the expensive project. Despite intense controversy, the state agreed. Seattle reporter Lynda Mapes was inspired to write a book about the background to this dramatic clash of cultures. Artifacts from the Tse-whit-zen village excavation will be on display during a related event on Sunday, May 17 at 2 – 4 pm at the Seattle Central Public Library at 1000 Fourth Avenue.
Breaking Ground is published by the University of Washington Press.
See http://www.washington.edu/uwpress/search/books/MAPBRE.html
One of the Lower Elwha Klallam’s last fluent speakers of the Klallam language, Bea Charles, 89, died on April 20 2009. Since 1992, she had diligently worked with a linguist in recording and analyzing the language. Thanks to her and other devoted elders the language is now taught in a Port Angeles High School.
Discussions and planning are underway for a Tsimshian 2011 Cultural Event, a Tribal Journey by canoe along the Pacific coast from Metlakatla Alaska to the Tlingit village of Saxman, Alaska, through to British Columbia: to Port Simpson, Metlakatla and on to Prince Rupert BC. For this and upcoming 2009 events, see the Tribal Journey’s website at http://tribaljourneys.com
Every year the Vancouver Airport Art Foundation (YVRAF) awards scholarships to young First Nations artists (see The Beat January 2009). The winners for 2009 have been chosen and the official announcement and reception in their honour will be held in Vancouver on May 27. See http://www.yvraf.com/
The Lions Lillooet Lake Rodeo & Pow-Wow will be held from Saturday May 16 to Monday May 18 2009 at nearby Mt. Currie Rodeo Grounds. Rodeo competitions will be held, as well as Pow-Wow competitions for B.C., First Nations dance and drumming. For more information contact Rosalinde James at 604 894 1812.
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Comments, news and new subscribers to this free newsletter are welcomed. Please write to: editor@coastalartbeat.ca
Past issues are available at our website http://www.coastalartbeat.ca
Thank you to Mique’l Icesis Askren for her extensive information on Metlakatla, Alaska. Thanks go to David Dumaresq, Martin Landmann, Peter Morin, Mike Dangeli, Stan Bevan, Dan Wallace, Martine Reid, Coleen Rogers and others, for their kind assistance.
If you are searching for particular stories covered in past issues, try
searching the web with Google using 'site:coastalartbeat.ca' with your search terms. For example, to find all references to Bill Reid try:
Bill Reid site:coastalartbeat.ca
The Beat is an independent, not-for-profit project written and published in Vancouver Canada by Ann Cameron. Copyright 2009 Ann Cameron.