From Which Point of View
Forays into “contemporary art” in the galleries of Vancouver has me thinking about how NW Coast Native art is perceived depending on the discipline from which one is looking. I come first to a piece as an artist, second as a pigment specialist, then as an educator, and then kind of a mix of anthropologist, historian, critic, etc. But I’ve had plenty of experience while doing research over the past few years of approaching pieces with someone at my side who comes at it with entirely different eyes, education, experiences and senses.
Several years ago I was researching old Coast Salish wool and horn rattles and I had the good fortune to be able to study several extremely old ones at University of British Columbia’s Museum of Anthropology (UBC MOA). One rattle in particular was very old, estimated to be more than four hundred years old. Of course that was the one that really caught my interest, but not because of its age as much as because I noticed two colors of red on it and that it had an unusual and interesting design on it. I made a remark to one of the conservators working close to me about the reds and she came to look at it with me. I pointed out that one of the reds was obviously red ochre; it had all the characteristics of red ochre: slightly grainy, a particular shade of red, etc. Then I showed her an area that was a different red, one which to me was immediately obvious as berry juice. She was astounded. The other conservators gathered around to see this. None of them had ever noticed and there was nothing in the notes about the piece remarking this difference.
Then I asked if they realized what a unique design had been carved and painted into it and none could figure out what it was. When I showed them the eight “legs”, or tentacles and the beaked face they quickly grasped the design was of an octopus. No one had ever figured out what the design was. In the documentation on each piece residing in a museum is a section filled out with the description including any designs and what they are. The description on this one was “unknown design”. Neither was it noted that this rattle was unique in that it was not a Coast Salish design, but one that was clearly formline, from the North. As these rattles were used primarily by the Coast Salish for special ceremonial work, I was surprised to find one which looked “northern”. Up to the point where I sat down and examined this rattle, there was almost nothing noted about it other than age, material and a questionable culture group. When I left, the rattle had many notes that would accompany it back to it’s home museum as it was on loan from a very large and important museum in the east.
I came away from this with the realization that even within our field, each of us “sees” something different when we look at a piece of work.
I’ve gone on doing research, mostly about pre-trade pigments which has led me to cross paths with many people who work in museums, are culture keepers, are scientists, and a whole host of other professions. Throughout I’ve always been surprised at what I’ve been able to add to another person's body of knowledge about a piece by coming at it from my particular experience. I’ve been able to tell a curator a spectacular hat she has in her collection is especially important because it’s a twined cedar bark hat of the highest caliber of weaving as well as because it has an unusual combination of pigments on it. I’ve been able to explain to curators what particular pieces were used for, what different designs mean and let them know when something has been attributed to the wrong culture group.
I’ve had the good fortune to have the company of several curators of Ethnology accompany me while I’m doing research on pieces
Periodically I reread Diane Ackerman's "A Natural History of the Senses" and my most recent reading I caught this passage relating to music that I think relates well to Northwest Coast artists and all of us who work in this field: "The composer hears it perfectly in the resonant chambers of his imagination. The general audience hears it emotionally, without understanding its craft. Other composers hear it with an insider's knowledge of form, structure, history, and incunabula....”.
What I’ve learned is it now takes a whole community working together to decipher what was once readily apparent to another whole community. And that each of our parts in this is equally important in rebuilding the pictures of the past.
Forays into “contemporary art” in the galleries of Vancouver has me thinking about how NW Coast Native art is perceived depending on the discipline from which one is looking. I come first to a piece as an artist, second as a pigment specialist, then as an educator, and then kind of a mix of anthropologist, historian, critic, etc. But I’ve had plenty of experience while doing research over the past few years of approaching pieces with someone at my side who comes at it with entirely different eyes, education, experiences and senses.
Several years ago I was researching old Coast Salish wool and horn rattles and I had the good fortune to be able to study several extremely old ones at University of British Columbia’s Museum of Anthropology (UBC MOA). One rattle in particular was very old, estimated to be more than four hundred years old. Of course that was the one that really caught my interest, but not because of its age as much as because I noticed two colors of red on it and that it had an unusual and interesting design on it. I made a remark to one of the conservators working close to me about the reds and she came to look at it with me. I pointed out that one of the reds was obviously red ochre; it had all the characteristics of red ochre: slightly grainy, a particular shade of red, etc. Then I showed her an area that was a different red, one which to me was immediately obvious as berry juice. She was astounded. The other conservators gathered around to see this. None of them had ever noticed and there was nothing in the notes about the piece remarking this difference.
Then I asked if they realized what a unique design had been carved and painted into it and none could figure out what it was. When I showed them the eight “legs”, or tentacles and the beaked face they quickly grasped the design was of an octopus. No one had ever figured out what the design was. In the documentation on each piece residing in a museum is a section filled out with the description including any designs and what they are. The description on this one was “unknown design”. Neither was it noted that this rattle was unique in that it was not a Coast Salish design, but one that was clearly formline, from the North. As these rattles were used primarily by the Coast Salish for special ceremonial work, I was surprised to find one which looked “northern”. Up to the point where I sat down and examined this rattle, there was almost nothing noted about it other than age, material and a questionable culture group. When I left, the rattle had many notes that would accompany it back to it’s home museum as it was on loan from a very large and important museum in the east.
I came away from this with the realization that even within our field, each of us “sees” something different when we look at a piece of work.
I’ve gone on doing research, mostly about pre-trade pigments which has led me to cross paths with many people who work in museums, are culture keepers, are scientists, and a whole host of other professions. Throughout I’ve always been surprised at what I’ve been able to add to another person's body of knowledge about a piece by coming at it from my particular experience. I’ve been able to tell a curator a spectacular hat she has in her collection is especially important because it’s a twined cedar bark hat of the highest caliber of weaving as well as because it has an unusual combination of pigments on it. I’ve been able to explain to curators what particular pieces were used for, what different designs mean and let them know when something has been attributed to the wrong culture group.
I’ve had the good fortune to have the company of several curators of Ethnology accompany me while I’m doing research on pieces
Periodically I reread Diane Ackerman's "A Natural History of the Senses" and my most recent reading I caught this passage relating to music that I think relates well to Northwest Coast artists and all of us who work in this field: "The composer hears it perfectly in the resonant chambers of his imagination. The general audience hears it emotionally, without understanding its craft. Other composers hear it with an insider's knowledge of form, structure, history, and incunabula....”.
What I’ve learned is it now takes a whole community working together to decipher what was once readily apparent to another whole community. And that each of our parts in this is equally important in rebuilding the pictures of the past.
