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The Northwest Coast -- the Alaskan panhandle and British Columbia --
spawned the richest native culture in North America in the nineteenth
century. Abundant food and shelter allowed the people of the Northwest
Coast to devote significant resources to elaborate ceremonials and
celebrations. Professional artists created masks, boxes and bowls, ladles
and other objects in cedar, horn, argillite, copper, ivory and wool for
winter ceremonials and potlatches. Tlingit women produced spectacular
Chilkat blankets, each of which represented one year's work for the weaver.
The people of the Northwest Coast also made model totem poles and other
items for sale to the crews and passengers of ships.
Northwest Coast art features vivid stylized images of crest animals such as ravens, bears, eagles, beavers and killer whales. |
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