Tales of Ghosts: First Nations Art in British Columbia, 1922-1961 (review)

Tales of Ghosts: First Nations Art in British Columbia, 1922-1961 provides an overview of the production, circulation and consumption of art by Native artists during a period of great social and political change in British Columbia and Canada. Ronald W. Hawker exposes and then considers the multiple ways in which meaning has been created and consumed around First Nations art objects by its viewing audiences. In so doing, he brings a new line to bear on the role Native art has played in the negotiation of social and geographical spaces in British Columbia.

Hawker demonstrates the increasing role First Nations artists and communities have had in the positioning of their visual culture in British Columbia and Canada as objects of resistance to dominant political and social structures, rather than as simple objects for the intellectually curious, or for the tourist's gaze. The projects and art considered in the book are referred to by Hawker as 'public' art. They are pieces of art that were made for, or transferred to the public domain primarily by non-Native government or civilian officials. Hawker relies solely on the textual history of this era that remains in archives to inform his perspective. He states early on in the book that interviews with contemporary individuals would have complicated the reading of such sources. Hence he relies on the presence of First Nations voices in historical documents as well as those of non-Native participants, rather than seek to understand how the events he describes in his book are remembered today by the original participants, or how individuals memories of specific events circulate to create meaning for art today.

The book's ten chapters adhere to a loose chronology of events that chart the emergence of northwest coast art into public spaces. The foci of chapters include the infamous Cranmer Potlatch and confiscation of regalia by Indian Agent Halliday; the erection of totem poles in Stanley Park and Salish protest over such plans; the attempt by the federal government to bring the symbols of northwest coast art into the fold of national identity through totem pole preservation efforts in northern BC and a modern art exhibition in Ottawa that included named individual northwest coast artists; an examination of Depression-era political economics in which art was seen as a way by which Aboriginal people could be assimilated into the nation (in particular the plans of Rev George Raley are critiqued); the BC Indian Arts and Welfare Society's model of social reform through arts education for Native artists is considered through the work of Alice Ravenhill and Anthony Walsh; the use of art by carvers Mathias Joe and Mungo Martin and painter George Clutesi to bring attention to the growing tension over political differences and land disputes between Native and non-Native peoples; the efforts to 'preserve' Native heritage through museum and university programs driven by the agendas of a new league of non-Native 'experts' in Native art round out the book's content.

Hawker has laid a foundation for an interesting discussion on northwest coast art during the mid-twentieth century. The strength of this book is also its weakness. In trying to cover so much ground in one publication, Hawker is unable at times to give the reader desired details. As well, he does not allocate space to theorize critically the events he discusses. Hawker's choice to leave out contemporary voices and opinions leaves him open to the error of repeating inaccuracies in the historical record, and to critique over his interpretation of historical sources. A case in point is his discussion of the youth artist Francis Baptiste and the Inkameep Day School. Hawker repeatedly names the artist incorrectly as François Batiste (Baptiste signed his name Batiste on some paintings), and he haphazardly links references of the physical abuse suffered by students at the Colqualeeza residential school to his discussion of...