SEALASKA HERITAGE INSTITUTE 2017 Highlights
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SEALASKA HERITAGE INSTITUTE 2017 Highlights 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS Copyright © 2018 Sealaska Heritage Institute About Sealaska Heritage Institute • 4 All rights reserved. Letter from the President • 5 SEALASKA HERITAGE INSTITUTE 105 S. Seward St., Suite 201 Juneau, Alaska 99801 Programs 907.463.4844 • www.sealaskaheritage.org Art • 7 Education • 27 ISBN: 978–1–946019–24–0 Culture and History • 43 Advocacy • 55 Cover art of herring egg harvest by Tlingit artist Michaela Goade from Sealaska Heritage Institute’s Baby Raven Reads book Let’s go! A harvest story. Cover design by Kathy Dye. Communities Served • 59 Design and composition by Kathy Dye. Donors • 63 PHOTO CREDITS Financials • 73 Photos by Brian Wallace and Nobu Koch except for the following: page 4 by Ken Graham; page 5 by Scott Areman; page 7 by Sierra Wilson; pages 8–13 by Sydney Akagi; page 16 by Boards and Committees • 77 Rich McClear; page 17 by Steve Brown; page 18 by Kathy Marvin; page 19 by Davina Cole; page 20 of masks courtesy of Lemon Creek Correctional Facility; page 21, bottom, by Ronnie Fairbanks; page 22, bottom, by Eva Rowan; page 25 by Sydney Akagi; page 32 by Jasmine Staff • 79 James; page 51, lower right, courtesy of Sara Jacobsen; pages 54 and 84 by Getty Images; page 55 by Kathy Dye. Those Who Have Gone Before Us • 81 2 // 2017 annual report 3 LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT When I look back on 2017, I think about all of the people who have walked with us on this journey to perpetuate Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian art, languages, and cultures for nearly 40 years. Sealaska Heritage has succeeded because of the Elders, donors, artists, educators, authors, volunteers, and other supporters who have helped us along the way. Thank you for all that you do. Thanks also to our Board of Trustees, Council of Traditional Scholars, Native Artist Committee, and Southeast Regional Language Committee for guiding our work. And to Sealaska for providing us the annual base support and funds to leverage and use as matching money for grants that help sustain our educational, language, art and cultural programs. When I reflect on 2017, I will think about the artists and authors who came to us to produce our children’s books SHI President Rosita Kaaháni Worl. through Baby Raven Reads and about all of the families who enrolled in that program. Their participation helped us prove that Baby Raven Reads has been a success in boosting early About Sealaska Heritage Institute literacy in children. Their collective work and the work of our Sealaska Heritage Institute is a private nonprofit founded by Sealaska in 1980 at staff prompted the Library of Congress to bestow our Baby the urging of Elders to ensure the survival of Southeast Alaska Native cultures. Raven program with its 2017 Best Practice Honoree award. SHI’s goals are to promote cultural diversity and cross-cultural understanding through public services and events. SHI also conducts social scientific and public I will think about Bruce and Gretchen Jacobsen of Seattle 31,300 and their teenage daughter, Sara, who implored her parents policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history, and education TOTAL PEOPLE statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a to donate a Chilkat robe they had purchased years ago to SERVED IN 2017 Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee, and a Southeast the Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian. In a stunning display of Regional Language Committee. Its mission is to perpetuate and enhance Tlingit, generosity, the Jacobsens donated it to Sealaska Heritage, and in Haida, and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. SHI operates from the Walter 2017 we welcomed the Robe and the Spirit of Our Ancestors Soboleff Building, an educational facility in Juneau opened by SHI in 2015. home. Because of them, Native people will be able to study an ancestor’s sacred masterpiece for many years to come. 4 // 2017 annual report 5 We have a dream to make Juneau the Northwest Coast art capital of the world and to designate our art as a national treasure. The year 2017 was a reminder of all of the people who are with us on this journey. The most spectacular display of support came during our 2017 Tináa Art Auction, which raised $200,000 for SHI’s programs. To the artists, donors, art collectors, volunteers, sponsors, and all of the other people who gave to the auction, your support means the world to us. Thank you to the people across Alaska and in New Mexico who are working with us to grow art programs in Southeast Alaska and Santa Fe. In 2017, we signed agreements with the University of Alaska Southeast and school districts in Juneau, Klawock, and Hoonah to expand Northwest Coast art programs. The pact builds on an earlier agreement between SHI, UAS, and the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe to establish a four-year Northwest Coast art program. ART PROGRAM I will think about all of the dedicated language learners and teachers who enrolled in our new program to teach Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian languages in 2017. They are the people who are fighting to Sealaska Heritage sponsors programs to teach ancient art keep our languages alive. And I will think about our beloved Tlingit forms, expand markets for Northwest Coast artists, and to scholar and author Nora Keixwnéi Dauenhauer, who walked on before educate others about Native art. SHI’s goals are to make us in 2017. She and her late husband, Richard, laid the foundation for Juneau the Northwest Coast art capital of the world and to the people who are perpetuating the Tlingit language today. establish Northwest Coast art as a national treasure. SHI’s Native Artist Committee guides art programming. Sometimes I think our work seems daunting and that we never have enough time. But when I reflect on 2017, I will think about all of the • Tináa Art Auction people of like mind who are with us on this journey and of the giants • Artists in Residence who came before us upon whose shoulders we stand. • Workshops • Mentor-Apprentice Programs 3,040 • Northwest Coast Art High Schools PEOPLE & University Program SERVED IN 2017 • Native Art Markets Rosita Kaaháni Worl • Arts Excursions President • A Tribe Called Red Concert 6 // 2017 annual report 7 TINÁA NATIVE FASHION SHOW SHI’s 2017 Tináa Art Auction was a huge success and included work by some of the country’s most noted Native artists. Forty-two artists and donors gave pieces, raising nearly $200,000 for art and culture programs. It included a Native Fashion Show which featured pieces by eleven designers. Opposite: Canoe Breaker: Southeast Wind’s Brother by Robert Davidson at auction in 2017. Tináa Art Auction 8 // 2017 annual report 9 Thunderbird Mask by Ray Watkins at auction in 2017. Tináa Art Auction 10 // 2017 annual report 11 Song of the Night, Reflection, Sleepless Shadow, Leaping Forward by Susan Point at auction in 2017. Tináa Art Auction 12 // 2017 annual report 13 Artists in Residence Clockwise from top: SHI sponsored artists-in- residence Lily Hope, Alison Marks, and Fred Fulmer in 2017. Lily spent many hours in 2016 working on the robe above when her mother, the renowned weaver Clarissa Rizal, passed away. Opposite: In 2017, Lily celebrated the completion of the robe in a public ceremony at Sealaska Heritage. It was then handed over to the Portland Museum of Art, which had commissioned the piece. 14 // 2017 annual report 15 Mentor-Apprentice Program In October 2017, Dachxhanx’ee Yán Yáagu (Grandchildren’s Canoe), adorned with the handprints of children as well as a Raven and Eagle design applied by Mark Sixbey, officially received its name and launched from the Sitka University of Alaska Southeast ramp with eight paddlers. Above, from left: The canoe was carved by apprentices T.J. Young, Tommy Joseph, and Jerrod and Nicholas Galanin with their mentor, master carver Steve Brown (not pictured) in 2016. Sealaska Heritage partnered with Sitka National Historical Park to make this 27-foot, Northern style ceremonial canoe from a log donated by Sealaska in an effort to preserve the ancient endangered knowledge of making the traditional watercraft known as dugouts. Opposite: SHI in 2017 sponsored workshops on how to make model dugout canoes in Kake and Klawock, taught by Brown. MODEL DUGOUT CANOES IN KAKE AND KLAWOCK 16 // 2017 annual report 17 In 2017, Sealaska Heritage sponsored a mentor-apprentice program to perpetuate the SPRUCE-ROOT WEAVING endangered, ancient art practice of spruce-root weaving. Students first learned to gather and process spruce roots through teachers Mary Lou King and Janice Criswell. Later, master weaver Delores Churchill with support from assistant instructor Corinne Parker taught them advanced weaving techniques and false embroidery. Mentor-Apprentice Program Churchill took the students to the Alaska State Museum to study historical masterpieces made of spruce root. From left: Corinne Parker, Hans Chester, Kathy Marvin, Delores Churchill, Janice Criswell, Mary Bernhardt, Yolanda Fulmer, and Deborah McLavey. 18 // 2017 annual report 19 Below: SHI in 2017 provided business classes and Northwest Coast art carving classes to Alaska Native residents at Juneau’s Lemon Creek Correctional Center. The goal is to connect them to their culture and to give them a means to earn an income before and after release. The program also was provided to community members. Workshops SHI offered workshops through its Jinéit Art Academy Youth Program in Craig, Juneau, Sitka, and Top right and above: In 2017, SHI sponsored a workshop on how to make copper tináas (shields) Angoon in 2017.