Native art and artifacts exhibit to visit Calgary

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Decorated cradleboards, an eagle feather bonnet, southwestern pottery and numerous other artifacts will be showcased during a unique presentation at Calgary's Glenbow Museum.

Powerful Images, an exhibit of Aboriginal art work, will run from July 3 to Sept. 26. The presentation will feature the traditional and contemporary works of regional and internationally-recognized artists. Materials such as paintings, sculptures and children's toys that date back hundreds of years will also be featured.

"There will be Aboriginal interpreters at the museum during the display," said Gerry Conaty, senior curator of ethnology at the Glenbow Museum. "Local storytellers and speakers will be on hand," he said.

All of the presentations are a collaborative project of Museums West, a consortium of 10 museums located in western North America. The 10 museums are dedicated to the history, art and cultures of the West. They exhibit both non-Aboriginal and Aboriginal western displays and each of these museums holds permanent collections of historically and esthetically important art and artifacts. They showcase a wide variety of western-related educational exhibits and public programs. The Powerful Images exhibit will be travelling to eight of the 10 contributing museums.

The exhibit will visit the Glenbow; the Buffalo Bill Historical Center in Cody, Wyoming; the Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art in Indianapolis, Indiana; the Gilcrease Museum in Tulsa, Oklahoma; the Heard Museum of Phoenix, Arizona; the National Cowboy Hall of Fame in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; the National Museum of Wildlife Art of Jackson, Wyoming; and the Autry Museum of Western Heritage in Los Angeles, California. The Powerful Images exhibit has already been on display at three of the seven museums. Calgary's Glenbow Museum is the only museum in Canada that will be showcasing the artifacts.

"We are the only Canadian museum of the Museums West consortia," said Nancy Cope, media relations specialist at the Glenbow Museum. "It is going to be an exciting exhibit. We will be having a whole bunch of activities during the exhibit," she said.

A wide range of public programs will be offered during the run of the exhibition to give families the opportunity to enjoy the displays. Programs include the discovery cart, a rotating art-making activity for children, X-Ray Paintings with Norval Morrisseau, and Beautiful Beads, where students get to create their own accessories based on traditional designs. Workshops with the Broken Knife Drum Group from the Tsuu T'ina Nation in southern Alberta will teach traditional songs and drumming. Stick and dice storytelling, traditional stick games and other activities will also be available. The museum's opening celebration will be held on July 3, with a performance by Tom Jackson.

"Connections to Collections", is a four-part series that will also be showcased during the exhibition. The series will include a collection of work by Norval Morrisseau, an Ojibway artist who began to show his work in the early 1960s. He was the first artist to develop a modern pictograph style, often referred to as the Woodland Style of Native art, or legend painting. Another exhibit will be a contemporary First Nations art collection. It invites artists to explore the museum's rich collections and to create new works based on their explorations. Artist Bob Boyer, a Saskatchewan-based Metis who is a renowned artist, sculptor, teacher and curator, will also be featured. An exhibit titled Moccasins: Art and Sole, will also be on hand. This exhibition will feature the many decorative methods and motifs that were used by First Nations people. The men's, women's and children's moccasins showcased will come from communities across Alberta. The differences in design and decoration and the stories behind the moccasins will be highlighted. All four exhibitions will complement the theme of Powerful Images.

"We are really excited to have this exhibit at Genbow. It is a way for the people in Western Canada and tourists to learn about Native culture," said Cope.