Alaska Native Art
Encyclopedia
Alaska Native cultures are rich and diverse, and their art forms are magnificent representations of their history, skills, tradition, adaptation, and nearly twenty thousand years of continuous life in some of the most remote places on earth. Yet these art forms are largely unseen and unknown outside the state of Alaska, due to distance from the art markets of the world. Therefore the artists have not received the recognition one would expect for work of this quality.
Many objects traded were valued for their functionality: clothing woven of grass, harpoon tips carved from the ivory
tusk of the walrus; rainproof outerwear sewn from membranes in the intestines of seals; and animal skins valued for their warmth and durability. Gradually, these items were refined to be more decorative, as a way to increase their value in trade. For example, a walrus
tusk might be etched with many hunting scenes depicting life of the coastal people; later, this technique would come to be known as "scrimshaw
" when brought back to New England
on whaling
ships. Elaborate patterns in beadwork
were designed as the beads themselves arrived through trade; Regalia
of all types used for ceremonial purposes – masks, woven clothing, hats, dance fans – all became souvenirs for the whalers
and explorers
of the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. Even the towering totem poles from Southeastern Alaska found their way back to the East Coast of the United States, where they formed the basis of many museum collections.
While the art forms were and still are as different as the cultures of the Native people who made them – Athabascan Indians of the vast Interior, Inupiaq of the Northwestern Arctic
coasts; Yupik and St. Lawrence Island
Yupik of the Bering Sea
coast; Aleuts and Alutiiq
people from the Aleutian
islands; and the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian
Indians often known as Northwest Coastal tribes – they commonly evoke references to living in harmony with nature and all its many creatures. No part of an animal hunted, fished or trapped could be wasted, for example, so one might see boots or "mukluks" made of bearded seal skin for soles, salmon skin for the outer layer, and straps of caribou or deerskin, perhaps even dyed with berries. As Native people lived off the land and the sea, their relationships to a particular place could always be seen in their objects in both physical and metaphorical terms. As traditions evolved through more "westernization" with Russian America in the 17th century and Territorial Alaska
beginning in 1867 and finally the creation of Alaska as our 49th State in 1959, so did their art forms.
All are continually evolving, blurring the distinction between what an art critic today might want to categorize as "traditional" versus "contemporary" Native art
. And contemporary, international art values have a place in Native Alaska art. Wall-size paintings, three-dimensional mobiles, life-size bronze castings and marble sculpture
s, to name just a few categories, fill galleries alongside bears carved from whalebones, cribbage boards honed from full-length walrus tusks, fine jewelry etched of copper and silvers; Nephrite
jade
and musk ox
horn polished into bracelets, bentwood
boxes carved from coastal white cedar trees; and baskets of infinite shapes and designs, from birch bark
or woven spruce root, beach grasses or the baleen
from a bowhead whale
, all intricately woven and shaped into vessels of all sizes.
The Yup'ik tribes traditionally decorate most all of their tools, even ones that perform smaller functions. One of their most popular forms of art are masks, which are generally made of wood and range in size from a few inches tall to several pounds in weight. They most often create masks for ceremonies but the masks are traditionally destroyed after being used. These masks are used to bring the person wearing it luck and good fortune in hunts. Masks are the result of multiple persons efforts, sometimes created by one in mind but physically created by another
The Tlingit tribes' artwork is also frequently functional. Their artwork often consists of clothing and carvings, including canoes and totem poles, which are still well-recognized today. The tools generally used for carving ares knives, traditionally made of shell, stone or bone, depending on the artist and what its purpose. The materials that are carved were bone of sheep or goat, and most often wood. Many types of wood are found in the southeastern panhandle of Alaska; some major species include cedar (both yellow and red) for totems and canoes, and finally, alder is used in making dishes and utensils for eating since that wood does not impart its taste onto food. Totem poles always tell a story, since the Tlingit culture traditional is an oral culture with minimal written history. Each animal on a totem pole represent family crests or tells a specific story.
, a non-profit organization, is dedicated to supporting Native artists and their subsistence lifestyles based on living in harmony with the environment. The University of Alaska, Fairbanks has a Native art program, created in 1965.
History
Historically, "art" as a decorative concept did not traditionally exist among these indigenous people. Objects were utilitarian, although decorated in ways that conveyed images of spiritual or physical activity. It was not until Europeans and Asians first made contact with the indigenous people of coastal Alaska in the 17th century that such non-utilitarian art objects began to be traded in exchange for metal implements, cloth, and foodstuffs such as tea, flour, or sugar.Many objects traded were valued for their functionality: clothing woven of grass, harpoon tips carved from the ivory
Ivory
Ivory is a term for dentine, which constitutes the bulk of the teeth and tusks of animals, when used as a material for art or manufacturing. Ivory has been important since ancient times for making a range of items, from ivory carvings to false teeth, fans, dominoes, joint tubes, piano keys and...
tusk of the walrus; rainproof outerwear sewn from membranes in the intestines of seals; and animal skins valued for their warmth and durability. Gradually, these items were refined to be more decorative, as a way to increase their value in trade. For example, a walrus
Walrus
The walrus is a large flippered marine mammal with a discontinuous circumpolar distribution in the Arctic Ocean and sub-Arctic seas of the Northern Hemisphere. The walrus is the only living species in the Odobenidae family and Odobenus genus. It is subdivided into three subspecies: the Atlantic...
tusk might be etched with many hunting scenes depicting life of the coastal people; later, this technique would come to be known as "scrimshaw
Scrimshaw
Scrimshaw is the name given to handiwork created by whalers made from the byproducts of harvesting marine mammals. It is most commonly made out of the bones and teeth of sperm whales, the baleen of other whales, and the tusks of walruses...
" when brought back to New England
New England
New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...
on whaling
Whaling
Whaling is the hunting of whales mainly for meat and oil. Its earliest forms date to at least 3000 BC. Various coastal communities have long histories of sustenance whaling and harvesting beached whales...
ships. Elaborate patterns in beadwork
Beadwork
Beadwork is the art or craft of attaching beads to one another or to cloth, usually by the use of a needle and thread or soft, flexible wire. Most beadwork takes the form of jewelry or other personal adornment, but beads are also used in wall hangings and sculpture.Beadwork techniques are broadly...
were designed as the beads themselves arrived through trade; Regalia
Regalia
Regalia is Latin plurale tantum for the privileges and the insignia characteristic of a Sovereign.The word stems from the Latin substantivation of the adjective regalis, 'regal', itself from Rex, 'king'...
of all types used for ceremonial purposes – masks, woven clothing, hats, dance fans – all became souvenirs for the whalers
Whalers
Whalers may refer to:* Danbury Whalers,US ice-hockey team in the Federal Hockey League* Eden Whalers, Australian Rules Football team* Hartford Whalers, former US ice-hockey team* New Bedford Whalers, name of three US soccer teams...
and explorers
Exploration
Exploration is the act of searching or traveling around a terrain for the purpose of discovery of resources or information. Exploration occurs in all non-sessile animal species, including humans...
of the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. Even the towering totem poles from Southeastern Alaska found their way back to the East Coast of the United States, where they formed the basis of many museum collections.
While the art forms were and still are as different as the cultures of the Native people who made them – Athabascan Indians of the vast Interior, Inupiaq of the Northwestern Arctic
Arctic
The Arctic is a region located at the northern-most part of the Earth. The Arctic consists of the Arctic Ocean and parts of Canada, Russia, Greenland, the United States, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Iceland. The Arctic region consists of a vast, ice-covered ocean, surrounded by treeless permafrost...
coasts; Yupik and St. Lawrence Island
St. Lawrence Island
St. Lawrence Island is located west of mainland Alaska in the Bering Sea, just south of the Bering Strait, at about 63°30' North 173°20' West. The village of Gambell is located on the northwest cape, from the Chukchi Peninsula in the Russian Far East. The island is part of Alaska, but closer to...
Yupik of the Bering Sea
Bering Sea
The Bering Sea is a marginal sea of the Pacific Ocean. It comprises a deep water basin, which then rises through a narrow slope into the shallower water above the continental shelves....
coast; Aleuts and Alutiiq
Alutiiq
The Alutiiq , also called Pacific Yupik or Sugpiaq, are a southern coastal people of the Native peoples of Alaska. Their language is called Sugstun, and it is one of Eskimo languages, belonging to the Yup’ik branch of these languages. They are not to be confused with the Aleuts, who live further...
people from the Aleutian
Aleutian
Aleutian may refer to:*The Aleut people, the indigenous people of the Aleutian Islands, the Pribilof Islands, the Shumagin Islands, and the far western part of the Alaska Peninsula in Alaska and of Kamchatka Krai, Russia....
islands; and the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian
Tsimshian
The Tsimshian are an indigenous people of the Pacific Northwest Coast. Tsimshian translates to Inside the Skeena River. Their communities are in British Columbia and Alaska, around Terrace and Prince Rupert and the southernmost corner of Alaska on Annette Island. There are approximately 10,000...
Indians often known as Northwest Coastal tribes – they commonly evoke references to living in harmony with nature and all its many creatures. No part of an animal hunted, fished or trapped could be wasted, for example, so one might see boots or "mukluks" made of bearded seal skin for soles, salmon skin for the outer layer, and straps of caribou or deerskin, perhaps even dyed with berries. As Native people lived off the land and the sea, their relationships to a particular place could always be seen in their objects in both physical and metaphorical terms. As traditions evolved through more "westernization" with Russian America in the 17th century and Territorial Alaska
Alaska Territory
The Territory of Alaska was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from August 24, 1912, until January 3, 1959, when it was admitted to the Union as the State of Alaska...
beginning in 1867 and finally the creation of Alaska as our 49th State in 1959, so did their art forms.
All are continually evolving, blurring the distinction between what an art critic today might want to categorize as "traditional" versus "contemporary" Native art
Native American art
Visual arts by indigenous peoples of the Americas encompasses the visual artistic traditions of the indigenous peoples of the Americas from ancient times to the present...
. And contemporary, international art values have a place in Native Alaska art. Wall-size paintings, three-dimensional mobiles, life-size bronze castings and marble sculpture
Sculpture
Sculpture is three-dimensional artwork created by shaping or combining hard materials—typically stone such as marble—or metal, glass, or wood. Softer materials can also be used, such as clay, textiles, plastics, polymers and softer metals...
s, to name just a few categories, fill galleries alongside bears carved from whalebones, cribbage boards honed from full-length walrus tusks, fine jewelry etched of copper and silvers; Nephrite
Nephrite
Nephrite is a variety of the calcium and magnesium-rich amphibole mineral actinolite . The chemical formula for nephrite is Ca25Si8O222. It is one of two different mineral species called jade. The other mineral species known as jade is jadeite, which is a variety of pyroxene...
jade
Jade
Jade is an ornamental stone.The term jade is applied to two different metamorphic rocks that are made up of different silicate minerals:...
and musk ox
Musk Ox
The muskox is an Arctic mammal of the family Bovidae, noted for its thick coat and for the strong odor emitted by males, from which its name derives. This musky odor is used to attract females during mating season...
horn polished into bracelets, bentwood
Bentwood
Bentwood is a term used to describe furniture made by steaming wood, bending it, and letting it harden into curved shapes and patterns, and is most often used in the production of rocking chairs, cafe chairs, and other light furniture. The iconic No...
boxes carved from coastal white cedar trees; and baskets of infinite shapes and designs, from birch bark
Birch bark
Birch bark or birchbark is the bark of several Eurasian and North American birch trees of the genus Betula.The strong and water-resistant cardboard-like bark can be easily cut, bent, and sewn, which made it a valuable building, crafting, and writing material, since pre-historic times...
or woven spruce root, beach grasses or the baleen
Baleen
Baleen or whalebone is a filter-feeder system inside the mouths of baleen whales. The baleen system works when a whale opens its mouth underwater and then water pours into the whale's mouth. The whale then pushes the water out, and animals such as krill are filtered by the baleen and remain as food...
from a bowhead whale
Bowhead Whale
The bowhead whale is a baleen whale of the right whale family Balaenidae in suborder Mysticeti. A stocky dark-colored whale without a dorsal fin, it can grow to in length. This thick-bodied species can weigh to , second only to the blue whale, although the bowhead's maximum length is less than...
, all intricately woven and shaped into vessels of all sizes.
Specific tribes and their art forms
The Inupiat tribes create useful tools such as bows, arrows, harpoons, float discs, snow beaters, boot sole creasers, skin scrapers, fat removers, spoons, handles, rope, belts and other clothing from materials they find locally. These materials include fish skin, caribou hide, polar bear fur, whale baleen, old ivory and seal (all parts of each animal are normally used somehow for tool-making if not consumed). Masks were often made for ceremonial purposes, bringing the people, animals and spirits together in one being. Traditionally sculptures are not made for decoration, but as "good luck amulets" for hunting, or sometimes they are toys for small children. Objects are often colored with charcoal and then a layer of fish oil was also applied to assure it does not rub off. Although contemporary commercial paints are commonly used today. Mukluks (shoes) and parkas (jackets) were sewn by the women out of animal hides and were generally only elaborately decorated for ceremonies. This art form is called "skin-sewing."The Yup'ik tribes traditionally decorate most all of their tools, even ones that perform smaller functions. One of their most popular forms of art are masks, which are generally made of wood and range in size from a few inches tall to several pounds in weight. They most often create masks for ceremonies but the masks are traditionally destroyed after being used. These masks are used to bring the person wearing it luck and good fortune in hunts. Masks are the result of multiple persons efforts, sometimes created by one in mind but physically created by another
The Tlingit tribes' artwork is also frequently functional. Their artwork often consists of clothing and carvings, including canoes and totem poles, which are still well-recognized today. The tools generally used for carving ares knives, traditionally made of shell, stone or bone, depending on the artist and what its purpose. The materials that are carved were bone of sheep or goat, and most often wood. Many types of wood are found in the southeastern panhandle of Alaska; some major species include cedar (both yellow and red) for totems and canoes, and finally, alder is used in making dishes and utensils for eating since that wood does not impart its taste onto food. Totem poles always tell a story, since the Tlingit culture traditional is an oral culture with minimal written history. Each animal on a totem pole represent family crests or tells a specific story.
Today
With the advent of the internet, all of these art forms can now be seen and appreciated from anywhere. The Alaska Native Arts FoundationAlaska Native Arts Foundation
Established in 2002, the Alaska Native Arts Foundation is a non-profit organization formed to support the Alaska Native Art community. The organization, headed by Jonella Larson White, engages in many efforts to increase public awareness of the art and to create a vibrant and growing market for...
, a non-profit organization, is dedicated to supporting Native artists and their subsistence lifestyles based on living in harmony with the environment. The University of Alaska, Fairbanks has a Native art program, created in 1965.
See also
- Inuit artInuit artInuit art refers to artwork produced by Inuit people, that is, the people of the Arctic previously known as Eskimos, a term that is now often considered offensive outside Alaska...
- Native American artNative American artVisual arts by indigenous peoples of the Americas encompasses the visual artistic traditions of the indigenous peoples of the Americas from ancient times to the present...
- Northwest Coast artNorthwest Coast artNorthwest Coast art is the term commonly applied to a style of art created primarily by artists from Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian, Kwakwaka'wakw, Nuu-chah-nulth and other First Nations and Native American tribes of the Northwest Coast of North America, from pre-European-contact times up to the...
- Chilkat weavingChilkat weavingChilkat weaving is a traditional form of weaving practiced by Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian, and other Northwest coastal tribes of Alaska and British Columbia. Chilkat blankets are worn by high-ranking tribal members on civic or ceremonial occasions, including dances.-Background:The name derives from...
- PotlatchPotlatchA potlatch is a gift-giving festival and primary economic system practiced by indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast of Canada and United States. This includes Heiltsuk Nation, Haida, Nuxalk, Tlingit, Makah, Tsimshian, Nuu-chah-nulth, Kwakwaka'wakw, and Coast Salish cultures...
- Totem poleTotem poleTotem poles are monumental sculptures carved from large trees, mostly Western Red Cedar, by cultures of the indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America...