Visual Art has been an integral feature of NWC culture for thousands of years, the distinct styles said to be the least disrupted of North American Native traditions due to the remote location.

North, Central and South Coast

 The West Coast of BC, Canada 

Contemporary NWC Art is generally grouped into three styles based largely on location in the North, Central, or Southern regions, for example, the Haida/ Tlingit/ Tsimshian in the Northern areas, the Kwakwaka’wakw/ Kwa’Kiutl in the Central areas, and Coast and Strait Salish/ Chinookan/ Tillamook/ Kalapuyans/ Alesans from the southern territories.  There are subtle differences recognizable between the techniques of these artists, who generally employ a heraldic crest theme to their imagery, using uniquely stylized animal metaphors to represent certain powers or parables. 

• The Northern Haida/Tsimshian tribes are renown for a unique and refined theme that was closely followed, now called ‘formline style’.  Orthodox formline style art was coloured with black and red, and sometime blue/green, and was constructed from three main forms - the ‘ovoid’, the ‘U-form’ and the ‘formline’ - and the splits, T’s and crescents that add contour. 
• The Central groups incorporated much of the formline style, but added their own styling through bolder use of the forms and splits, and adding white, yellow, green and cobalt. 
• The art of the Southern Salish groups was more geometrical and stylized, less reliant on a set of forms, and sometimes had more realistic imagery.  The Southern groups techniques and patterns were influenced by their increased interaction with Eastern tribes via the mountain channels of the Fraser and Columbia Rivers. 

Ancient History

Despite these modern generalizations, the prehistoric ancestors of the peoples of these tribes are thought to have arrived on this land at different times and from many different areas, between 10,000 and 5,000 years ago, based on there being 45 diverse languages in the 13 separate language families found in this narrow strip of coast about 1,500 miles long, from Alaska to Oregon.  Archaeologists such as George MacDonald have concluded that there was continuous development of the main Art elements, and all the main stylistic features and object types were established by 1000 CE.  The Raven, for instance, appears in figures as old as the first millennium. 

Perhaps some of the most fascinating archaeological discoveries have been along the Fraser Valley, where villages have been uncovered with artifacts some 4,500 years old.  Another striking example of artifacts is the village site called Ozette, on Makah land on the Olympic Peninsula of Washington.  Around 1,500 CE a mudslide perfectly preserved four entire plank houses, and over 50,000 items – many which were perishables that would not usually have survived so long – like basketry and wood.   

 

Distinct Culture

The cultures of the NWC area developed and sustained styles and traditions distinct from the rest of North America, indeed, of the World, due to being isolated by the magnificent Mountain ranges on the East, and the Pacific Ocean on the West.  They did not mix and trade as much with the Eastern tribes over the many centuries of their tribal civilisation, and were colonized by Europeans almost 200 years later than other North American tribes.  This allowed less disruption of the development of art and culture than more centrally located tribes, as these remote groups were reached by colonization last, and were perhaps able to resist the influences most effectively. 

The first outside Collections of West Coast Tribal Art began in the late 1700’s, agented by merchant captains trading sea-otter pelts with the Natives.  At that time, there were likely 200,000 indigenous people in the area, with villages full of an immense range of richly decorated items, both functional and ceremonial, like carved storage boxes, utensils and jewellery.  Ornate ceremonial items such as masks and regalia, amulets, rattles, combs, totems, weapons and feast dishes were used and presented at many events, like Potlatches to demonstrate and ratify the position of tribe leaders, rites of passage like weddings and births, and spiritual rituals such as healings and initiations.

Within a century, the population had fallen by 80%, with only 40,000 remaining, due largely to deadly diseases that immigrant Europeans had introduced, like smallpox.  With such drastic times upon them, intermarriages between tribes increased, as did the intensity and frequency of Potlatches and other ceremonies.  These activities became viewed as hostile and threatening by the new Canadian Government, and for the 66 year period from 1885 to 1951 the Potlatch was actually Outlawed!

Still, the creation of Artfully worked objects continued, far beyond the intense, almost compulsive, decoration of functional items.  New settlers brought a market for trading Art, and provided much-improved tools and materials.  Carving of traditional formline and tribal imagery onto ‘Coppers’ and Argillite became very popular. 

 

Into Today

Since the repealing of the misguided legal restrictions, contemporary Artists have revived many of the traditional techniques and crests, and NWC Art is collected worldwide.  The connection to history and to Nature invoked by such ancient, traditional and distinct pagan imagery is compelling to many.

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