Early Trade Pipe with Euro-American Figure and Stylized Haida Animal and Bowl Carved with a Human Head

Provenance:
Private Collection, Vancouver

Literature:
Peter L. Macnair and Alan L. Hoover, The Magic Leaves: A History of Haida Argillite Carving, 2002, similar trade pipes reproduced pages 72, 73 and 76
Notes:
Smoking was introduced to the Haida by the Euro-American explorers, whalers and traders who arrived on the Northwest Coast at the end of the eighteenth century. Once the Hudson's Bay Company was established there, it imported and sold clay pipes. Seeing this, the Haida took up carving argillite pipes, ranging from plain to complex, often combining Euro-American figures with stylized animals. In these objects, the bowl was fully formed and could have been used for smoking. The bowls often took the form of a human head, as does this one. According to Peter Macnair and Alan Hoover, the production of these pipes flourished during the two or three decades following 1850. This early trade pipe is finely carved and features the use of bone in the head of the Euro-American man. Both the stylized bear-like animal, carved using the Haida motif of ovoid eyes, and the human head on the bowl are strong and expressive. Exquisite works such as this, evincing Haida interest in other cultures appearing on their shores, are rare to the market.