B:20 Mask making in the Yukon

Still here. At work. I was just touring some people through the building. The were looking for First Nations masks and I was explaining the confused history/tradition of mask making in the Yukon. The short answer is: Westerners arrived and messed up the First Nations traditional way of life and then the government and missionaries banned ceremonies such as potlatches and dances, where ceremonial objects such as masks were used. Also, masks were never meant as commodities, they were objects imbued with life and at the end of their cycle they were allowed to return to the earth.

So, take fifty years of Western mucking and that's about two generations right there. Ergo, mask making tradition was interrupted. The masks that are made now are influenced mainly by Coastal First Nations and historical motifs that had been preserved in photographs and museums. Many modern mask makers look to other aboriginal traditions and some have invented their own styles, divergent from the more coastally influenced norm. Anyway, that's the nutshell version. I suggest you look up the carving of Keith Wolf Smarch and Eugene Alfred to get a good idea of Yukon carving, mask or otherwise.

This entry may have to double for both 4:30 and 5pm, because shortly I'm going to leave and may well be in transit at the next appointed time.