Haida Shark

Provenance:
Norma Pendray Wilson, Victoria

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H.L. Norris, Victoria

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By descent to the present Private Collection, Vancouver

Literature:
The Edenshaw Legacy: Contemporary Haida Art, CBC video, 1986, this work is highlighted

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Raven Travelling: Two Centuries of Haida Art, Vancouver Art Gallery, 2006, two similar works reproduced catalogue #64 and #65, page 93
Notes:
Few names are as well~known in the history of Northwest Coast First Nations art as that of Charles Edenshaw, circa 1839 ~ 1920. Over his six~decade career, Edenshaw became renowned among his own people and outside Haida society for his masterful work in wood, argillite, ivory, silver and gold. This bracelet, engraved of hammered coin silver, is a classic example of Edenshaw's mature and distinctive compositional style.

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Born in Skidegate on Haida Gwaii, da.a xiigang was the nephew and heir of Albert Edward Edenshaw, or 7idansuu, chief of the saangga.ahl 'laanaas~sdast'a.aas Eagles (the name Edenshaw is an anglicization of the name 7idansuu; the symbol "7" represents a glottal stop in the Haida orthography). It was the elder Edenshaw who probably served as the young artist's teacher of Haida art and philosophy. After moving to Old Massett in 1882, da.a xiigang was baptized and chose his English name, Charles. He also inherited his uncle's high~ranking position, together with the 7idansuu name.

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Charles Edenshaw was a full~time carver. Like other Haida people who survived the earlier epidemics, he lived and worked through a time of profound culture change. He traveled widely along the coast, engraving bracelets, earrings, spoons and other items as gifts and for sale to a primarily Native clientele. He also became the first Haida artist whose work was well~documented by anthropologists and collectors. In the 1860s silver and gold coins became common currency on the coast, and American dollars replaced copper and other metals as the material of choice for Haida jewellery. Da.a xiigang became renowned as a silversmith, unsurpassed among his peers.

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Edenshaw must be acknowledged as an artist of his time, drawing on Haida history, narrative and lived experience as well as the European ideas and images that interested him. Although he never signed his work, he developed an inventive conceptualization and compositional style that influenced other artists of his generation, was studied and emulated by Bill Reid, and continues to inform the work of Haida artists today. Through ongoing research on works such as this bracelet and other carvings and paintings attributed to his hand, the qualities of Edenshaw's creative vision are becoming more clearly understood.

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Certain crest images appear to have been especially popular among his Native clients. Edenshaw often repeated such images, including the shark compositions, or developed new interpretations that show a progression in his personal style. Bill Holm describes this bracelet as being from the period of Edenshaw's mature style, in which the composition is more flowing and the details simpler than the several earlier shark bracelets he has seen. (On the other hand, some of the more complex bracelet compositions may have been from the same period or even later, their degree of complexity relating, in part, to the specific commission or the market situation of the moment.) The shark crest motif is portrayed as a split representation, in which the two sides of the body extend outward from the centrally placed head. Here the shark's face is characterized by almost circular eyes, a small beaked motif on the "forehead," gill slits on the sides and triangular teeth; all elements which are present in variable forms in his other shark compositions. A sensitive awareness of the relationship of positive and negative spaces within the overall field animates much of Edenshaw's two~dimensional work, as do such details as the complex of U~shaped forms inside each fin, bordered by a double~engraved line. The treatment of background areas is another defining feature. Fine cross~ and parallel hatching adds texture and contrast to the image. Some hatched areas are characterized by a wide split; almost all are outlined with double engraving. Eyes and joints are somewhat hollowed to give a further sense of depth.

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The quality of Edenshaw's engraving and composition is especially astounding in light of his method. Bracelets such as this one were hammered directly from coins or cast ingots. Edenshaw would then shape the bracelet around a wooden mold that was held in the hand, and engraving would begin. It was a difficult technique, admired by contemporary Haida artists who work on the flat strip of silver first, before bending it to shape. Working in the round, Edenshaw was able to accomplish the sophistication of line and form that this bracelet exemplifies.

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We thank Karen Duffek, Curator of Art at The UBC Museum of Anthropology, for contributing the above essay.

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Included with this lot is a letter of authentication dated August 26, 1998 from Bill Holm, former curator of Northwest Coast Indian Art at the Burke Memorial Museum and professor of art history at the University of Washington, as well as author of several books on Northwest Coast native art. In this letter Holm writes, "Your bracelet is from the period of Edenshaw's mature style, more flowing and with simpler detail than the several earlier shark bracelets that I have seen. It is a very fine example." Accompanied as well by correspondence with Bill McLennan at the Museum of Anthropology, Vancouver, also confirming his opinion that this work is by Charles Edenshaw. Edenshaw lived circa 1839 to 1920. The 1924 death date is often given, but that was the date of Edenshaw's headstone ceremony, apparently; he died in 1920 (the same year Bill Reid was born). In 1975 Bill Reid made a small repair on the inside of the bracelet and inscribed the work as such, repaired Reid 75.