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Kunstgeschiedenis-WAS - Lecture 9 - Art and identity
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Lecture notes of 14 pages for the course World Art Studies at UL (College notes)
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1World of Art Part II – Identities (lecture 6-8) of Part III Agency
Lecture 9 (21/11) Art and Identity - The First Nations in British Columbia, Canada
The tale of the totem
I’ve had to go back to the past, to talk about the future, Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun
In the Tale of the Totem the art of the First nations people in British Columbia was discussed in
several stages:
• the land and the people in the pre-contact era: From north to south we have the Tlingit
(actually part of Alaska), Tsimshian, Haida, Heiltsuk (Bella Bella), Nuxalk (Bella Cuola),
Kwakwaka’wakw (Kwatiutl), Nuu-Chah-Nulth (Nootka), Coast Salish, Makah and the
Quinault. All these peoples left no written records; their history and beliefs were passed on
to the next generations by oral traditions. Structure of society, house building, potlatch
ceremonies, totems
• the confrontation with Europeans and the European take-over and the consequences this
had on First Nation culture.
• the musealization of First nation culture and the artist Emily Carr, who in her writings
captured the sadness of the dwindling First nation way of life, while her paintings, more
than photographs could ever have done, captured the beauty of the decaying ruins of the
First nation villages.
• the revival, or rather re-invention of First nation culture in the wake of the slow recognition
of First nations’ rights and claims, the museums’ role in this indigenization process
• some first nation artists who triggered this revival in search of and as a tribute to their
aboriginal identity.
The development was briefly as follows:
In 1778 Captain James Cook (1728-1799) and his officers were the first Europeans to set foot on the
west coast of what is now British Columbia, Canada. Thereafter, contacts became increasingly more
frequent. Initially, the contact between the native populations and the western explorers and traders
was friendly. The newcomers brought new tools, new foods, new materials and also wealth to the
native people. This led to a flourishing of their art, culminating in the creation of huge numbers of
increasingly large and intricate totem poles.
By the late nineteenth-century, however, things had turned sour. The Europeans had come to stay
and thought of the country as a ‘terra nullius’, a land inhabited by savages, who had no political or
legal organization and who wasted their land by not cultivating it. It was therefore a land that
Europeans thought they could claim as their own and improve by settling and developing it. This was
even considered as a noble mission, for, supposedly, they brought the savages government and
civilization. However, the settlers’ guns and diseases created great havoc among the native tribes
and wiped out as much as 90 percent of the native population, which tipped the balance in the
favour of the settlers came to form the majority of the population.
As the colonisation of the land progressed, all forms of First Nation culture (formerly known as Indian
culture), heritage, values and language were gradually, but systematically undermined by being
severely restricted; restrictions, moreover, that were to last well into the twentieth century.
, 2
Indeed, by the 1920s First Nation culture was considered fit only for the museum, as ethnographic
artefacts of a dying or dead culture. Fortunately, subsequent history has shown that the death
certificate was given out prematurely. In some remote villages, far away from government control,
the First nation culture survived and it was from here that, as the First nations started reclaiming
their rights, the culture of their ancestors was eventually passed on to future generations. The art,
that in the decennia before had been stowed away in museums all over the world, enabled First
Nations’ artists to rediscover their own culture and has played a central role in the revival if First
Nation culture. To move forward, First Nation artists felt they had to retrace their roots.
Today, First Nations are again proud of their heritage, are re-creating and, in part, re-inventing it. The
result is that today, all over British Columbia, totems are once more being erected.
As Norman Tait, a Nisga’a carver, has it: ‘Totem poles are all about cultural
identity. They are a way of the native people saying: “We’re here and our
culture is still here”. I’m glad when I carve a pole because I want people to
know that we still carve totem poles and that stories go with the poles’.
The 1991 painting Scorches earth, Clear Cut Logging on Native Sovereign
Land. Shaman coming to Fix by Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun, whose work
is currently on show in the Museum of Antropology in Vancouver BC,
expresses the First Nation feeling about their lot to perfection and is a
prime example of how art can be an expression of identity.
1.The land and the people in the pre-contact era:
From north to south of Canada, the Haida, the Nuxalk, the Kwakwaka'wakw, the Tlingit, the
Tsimshian and the Coast Salish, Makah and the Quinault. All these peoples left no written records;
their history and beliefs were passed on to the next generations by oral traditions. Structure of
society, house building, potlatch ceremonies, totems
What is now the Northwest Coast of Canada, is on the slide on the right, used to be a rather isolated
area stretching from North California to Alaska for some 2000 kilometers, with the Pacific Ocean to
the west and the Rocky Mountains to the east, so it was very isolated. It's a very rugged coastline,
deeply indented and broken by countless little inlets, channels, bays and rivers, and scattered along it
are hundreds of large and small islands. And it was in these sheltered place and inlets that the native
people built their villages where they lived in the seasons. They hunted, they fished, and they
gathered food. The sea produced seafood, like salmon in clams. The otter on the left is eating a clam,
so very little clams. As well as sea otters, whose pelts were much valued. And there was a term for
rainforest that provided game and said a word that could be used for their large plant houses, totem
poles, canoes. ceremonial masks and other objects. Although the peoples shared one culture, they
were in fact several distinct nations, belonging to several different language families, and customs,
practices, and art styles differed from the north to the south. From north to south we have the Tlingit
(actually part of Alaska), Tsimshian, Haida, Heiltsuk (Bella Bella), Nuxalk (Bella Cuola),
Kwakwaka’wakw (Kwatiutl), Nuu-Chah-Nulth (Nootka), Coast Salish, Makah and the Quinault. All
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