Bent-corner Box with Killer Whale Design Item Number: 05.588.7312 from the Brooklyn Museum
Description
This bentwood corner bowl was made by the distinctly Northwest Coast process called kerfing. A single plank of wood is first trimmed, notched , steamed and bent. The bottom and sides were then pegged or sewn together with tree root. Finally the bowl is decorated with carving, painting and adding operculum shell trims. The large bowl would have been used for dried food. The abstracted design on the sides represents a killer whale.
Credit Line
Museum Expedition 1905, Museum Collection Fund
Label
These Native American objects represent just a few of the items made in the late nineteenth and the early twentieth century, primarily for sale to dealers and collectors to satisfy the growing market for indigenous products. Finely coiled baskets like the example by the Maidu weaver Mary Kea’a’ala Azbill were in great demand, as were Zuni Kachina dolls. The desire for Eskimo objects such as the ivory pipe engraved with a whale-hunting scene was accelerated by the Klondike Gold Rush in 1897. To appeal to non-Native patrons, Native artists invented new designs using trade materials such as the glass beads forming the embroidered floral arrangement on the northeastern puzzle bag (so named for the way its pieces fold together to keep it closed). Other artists used traditional materials but tailored designs to non-Native aesthetics, as seen in the porcupine-quill box. The Navajo quickly adapted to the Spanish introduction of silver coins and silver mining in the seventeenth century, embellishing their traditional wrist guards with hammered silver. Some artists retained both traditional materials and designs but produced greater quantities of popular items such as the Plains owl pipe bowl made from Catlinite (red pipestone).
Item History
- Made between 1868 and 1933
What
- Name
- Bent-corner Box with Killer Whale Design
- Identification Number
- 05.588.7312
- Type of Item
- killer whale, design and box
- Material
- sea snail operculum, plant fibre, cotton twine and yellow cedar
- Overall
- length 8.5 in, width 19.5 in, height 17.0 in
Who
- Culture
- Haida
Where
- Holding Institution
- Brooklyn Museum
When
- Creation Date
- between 1868 and 1933
Other
- Classification
- Food/Drink