I bought a knife!

Today during training, we visited the Sulianich Art Center right across the street from the Northwest Arctic Heritage Center where I work.  This art center is a non-profit where local artists can send their work, which in turn is sold across the country and all the profits are returned to the artist.  Not only does this process support the arts economically, it also supports the continuation of Inupiaq tradition.

Some of the owners were traditional dancers and drummers.  They shared with us how the drums are traditionally constructed out of walrus stomach and wood from an ash tree (there are trees around here if you move inland).  Nowadays drums are made of non-traditional material, like vinyl.

They showed us a very fancy parkie (they say that instead of 'parka') made out of ground squirrel pelts.  One of the owners shared a story with us of summer days in his childhood spent waiting outside ground squirrel burrows to snare the little guys with fishing line.  They would skin the squirrel in such a fashion that they didn't have to cut the pelt. Then he would roast the rest of the squirrel over a fire right there on the hill.

He recalled the transition he was required to make as a boy from traditional furs to JC Penny clothes in order to attend school in Kotzebue in the early 70s.  He used to stuff his boots with grass for padding until they were replaced with store-bought felt insoles.

We were able to visit with local carvers in the back of the shop, where artist chisel wood and scrimshaw whale baleen.  Baleen is the comb-like structures analogous to teeth on whales, used for filtering water and catching krill.  A basket woven out of baleen will sell for $400.

One of the local carvers sold me a knife for $75.  The handle is made out of caribou antler with the image of a seal carved into the side and the face of a hunter carved into the butt.  Th eyes of the sea and the hunter are inlaid baleen.  The blade is made of mastodon ivory.  Yes, mastodon ivory! The petrified tusk of a long extinct relative of the woolly mammoth!  How cool is that!!!  Apparently the ivory shards can be found along the beaches of the peninsula, but you must look carefully because it looks like wood.

So that's pretty cool.  I guess the art center will offer workshops about making traditional knives.  I look forward to visiting with them throughout my stay here.