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History Of Use

These 62 small works (3223/1-62) comprise a collection of drawings in pencil, ink, pencil crayon, and felt pen made by the artist between the years 1968 and 2015. During that period the artist has identified himself by the following names: Ron Hamilton; Hupquatchew; Ki-ke-in; Kwayatsapalth; Chuuchkamalthnii; and Haa’yuups. The drawings are, for the most part, applied to the backs of bookmarks acquired from a range of bookshops; some are applied to other pieces of paper or cutouts from his earlier silkscreen prints. Many of the images represent killer whales, often in conjunction with accoutrements and symbols of Nuu-chah-nulth whaling. The juxtaposition of bookmark and representation of Nuu-chah-nulth himwits’a, or narrative, is a deliberate and meaningful placement of two distinct knowledge systems in relationship with one another. Ephemeral drawings like these were not created for the market; the artist has long made them for himself and sometimes as gifts for relatives and friends; they are a way of sharing his knowledge and experience about Nuu-chah-nulth ways of knowing, thinking about, and being in this world; they are expressive of what he calls kiitskiitsa: marks made with intention.

Description

A horizontally oriented pencil drawing on a beige bookmark. The front-side of the bookmark is a hand-drawn image of five seal-like creatures. The bottom half of the page is decorated with a random pattern of short lines, creating the appearance of water(?). All five creatures have whiskers on their snouts, and large canine teeth. On the far left-side of the page, the head of a seal is drawn beside the tail of another seal. The centre and second from the left creatures are both vertically oriented; a curved double line pattern decorates their bodies, and drawn above the rear flippers is a diamond-shape. The second from the right is drawn upside down; the body is decorated with small open circles extending from the face towards the rear flippers, and the front flippers are embellished with an elongated diamond-shape within an oval. The seal drawn on the far right edge of the page is horizontally oriented; the front flipper is decorated with an elongated diamond-shape within an oval, the body is embellished with a creature inside it, and positioned above the rear flipper is a diamond-shape within an oval. The reverse-side of the bookmark is machine-printed in black ink. The page is vertically oriented; at the top is an image of a person reading a book and below is a quote from Sara Nelson. The bookstore's commercial information, including the store's name, "Literati Books," is printed at the very bottom of the page.