Day 134 - Wolf mask
March 8, 2019
Gallery 356 unexpectedly brings me into Native North America; I had thought it would be another gallery devoted to Polynesia. The first objects I saw were canoe paddles painted with geometic fish-like designs. "Hmm," I thought to myself, "These Pacific Islander paddles look amazingly like works from the Pacific Northwest." Guess what? They are, in fact, from British Columbia.
Many of the works are more familiar to me than those from Africa and Island Southeast Asia, but I learn many new things. I see that there was a tradition of black-and-white pottery in Ancestral Puebloan culture -- it's not hard to draw the line between these works and Acoma pots. I learn that frogs, snakes, and lizards played a prominent role in Southwestern art because they emerged in greater numbers after the rainfalls that were so critical to Puebloan agriculture. I had never realized that the Mound Builder culture (at least I assume that that's what the caption "Mississippian, 13th-14h century" denotes) had a tradition of stone sculpture. One such sculpture, described as a "prisoner pipe," shows a kneeling, bent-over figure; his hands clutch his calves, his mouth is open in what is clearly not a smile. It's another reminder that we should not romanticize Native Americans, who waged war and captured prisoners just as did (and do) their white conquerors.
I very much like a Yup'ik mask that has the head, forelegs, and raised back of a caribou and the buttocks, legs, and feet of a human. But today's object, a wolf mask, stops me short in admiration. Made of wood, copper, animal hair, and abalone shell and perhaps 20 inches tall and 13 inches deep, it was made in Southeast Alaska in the 19th or early 20th century. It seems to me that the mask-maker, in using abalone to represent the animal's big teeth and glaring eyes, has captured the beast's ferocity and power. Objects such as this one, I read, were displayed at potlatches to validate the host's wealth and "aristocratic claims." Were I the owner, I would have hated to give this object away, as potlatch sponsors were expected to do.
It turns out that I'm in good company in appreciating this mask It was previously in the personal collection of Max Ernst! According to the placard, the Surrealists admired the aesthetic power of Northwest Coast art and the varied devices that native artists used.
Many of the works are more familiar to me than those from Africa and Island Southeast Asia, but I learn many new things. I see that there was a tradition of black-and-white pottery in Ancestral Puebloan culture -- it's not hard to draw the line between these works and Acoma pots. I learn that frogs, snakes, and lizards played a prominent role in Southwestern art because they emerged in greater numbers after the rainfalls that were so critical to Puebloan agriculture. I had never realized that the Mound Builder culture (at least I assume that that's what the caption "Mississippian, 13th-14h century" denotes) had a tradition of stone sculpture. One such sculpture, described as a "prisoner pipe," shows a kneeling, bent-over figure; his hands clutch his calves, his mouth is open in what is clearly not a smile. It's another reminder that we should not romanticize Native Americans, who waged war and captured prisoners just as did (and do) their white conquerors.
I very much like a Yup'ik mask that has the head, forelegs, and raised back of a caribou and the buttocks, legs, and feet of a human. But today's object, a wolf mask, stops me short in admiration. Made of wood, copper, animal hair, and abalone shell and perhaps 20 inches tall and 13 inches deep, it was made in Southeast Alaska in the 19th or early 20th century. It seems to me that the mask-maker, in using abalone to represent the animal's big teeth and glaring eyes, has captured the beast's ferocity and power. Objects such as this one, I read, were displayed at potlatches to validate the host's wealth and "aristocratic claims." Were I the owner, I would have hated to give this object away, as potlatch sponsors were expected to do.
It turns out that I'm in good company in appreciating this mask It was previously in the personal collection of Max Ernst! According to the placard, the Surrealists admired the aesthetic power of Northwest Coast art and the varied devices that native artists used.
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