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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;all_fakes, post: 3482654, member: 55&quot;]To continue the discussion, and do so without saying that anyone is wrong: there is indeed a progress or evolution in Northwest Coast Native art; and one expects that newer artists will both learn from their ancestors, and will carry the traditions forward, from the past into the present.&nbsp; In Northwest Coast Native art the deference to tradition is arguably more strict than in some other traditional arts; (read Bill Holm&#039;s &quot;Northwest Coast Indian Art; an Analysis of Form&quot; to study that aspect further).</p><p><br /></p><p>There is always a balancing act between deference to the traditions, and innovation. And different people may have differing opinions about a piece of art; some saying the artist has gone too far toward innovation, losing the tradition; others saying that the innovations are acceptably within the tradition.</p><p>Part of the tradition in Northwest Coast Native art is that various creatures are defined by specific features; for example, if it has a blowhole and/or dorsal fin, it must be a whale; and conversely, if it has no blowhole or dorsal fin, it cannot possibly be a whale.&nbsp; Likewise, curved beak = eagle; straight beak with circle representing daylight = raven.&nbsp; Under those standards, a lot of people would find Ms. Hunt&#039;s eagle and killer whale to be acceptably within the tradition; one has a fin, the other a curve that could be seen as a beak.&nbsp; I personally find the curve supposedly representing the wolf&#039;s tail to be quite a stretch.</p><p>But it is still jewelry, and many people might find it attractive; and opinions might differ, in any case.</p><p>Examples of innovation within the NW Coast tradition can be found within the work of Robert Davidson; in 1972 he began a series of prints which stripped a number of creatures down to only their essential elements; and later continued that journey in sculpture and paintings.&nbsp; The 1972 series &quot;feathers&quot; features creatures reduced to essential elements, folded up inside the shape of a feather.&nbsp; By &quot;essential elements&quot; I mean those features such as the blowhole which define a particular creature in NW Coast Native art; without which, it could not be seen as that creature.&nbsp; Some of the figures are killer whale, raven, wolf; and one which, by the time I spoke with him, he had forgotten exactly what it was: &quot;some kind of sea-bird, like a sandpiper.&quot;&nbsp; Many people would be hard-pressed to recognize the creatures in Davidson&#039;s &quot;Five Feathers;&quot; but the whale has a fin and blowhole; the raven has a straight beak; the wolf has a tail, and so on.&nbsp; I don&#039;t find his to be beyond the acceptable bounds of tradition; but they certainly go pretty far past the traditional boundaries.</p><p>See if you can tell which is which; in a typical Davidson joke, they all were printed in red on white only, but one could get the raven in either white or black.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]303905[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]303904[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]303903[/ATTACH][/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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