We are devoting our autumn season to back-to-back-to-back exhibits by three of the region’s top Native glass artists, in a celebration of the Northwest Native Art Glass movement. September brings Dan Friday (Lummi), October is Preston Singletary (Tlingit), and in November we close with Raven Skyriver (Tlingit). All three of these artists uses the medium of glass to reflect on aspects of their vibrant Northwest Coast Native heritage, but each does so with a different focus.
Dan Friday Solo Exhibition: Sept 6-30, Opens Sept 6, 6-8pm
Preston Singletary Solo Exhibition: Oct 4-28. Opens Oct 4, 6-8pm
Raven Skyriver – Confluence – Solo Exhibition: Nov 1-30, Opens Nov 1, 6-8pm
L to R: Preston Singletary at a demonstration; Dan Friday working at Cornimg Museum; Raven Skyriver working at Pilchuck.
Dan Friday (Lummi) is inspired by the material culture of the Lummi people: the gear with which they reefnet fish, one of the world’s oldest and most sustainable salmon-fishing techniques; the totem poles carved by his great-grandfather Joseph R. Hillaire (Kwul-kwul’t); and the cedar bark woven baskets and goat fur blankets of the great Lummi weavers.
Preston Singletary (Tlingit) is particularly focused on mythology and legendary characters, rendering stories of the Tlingit, Haida and other northern nations in blown and sandblasted glass. Singletary transforms epic legends along the sides of bentwood boxes, on totem poles made in collaboration with carvers David Svenson (Non-Indigenous) and Dave Franklin (Non-Indigenous), and in 2d prints.
Of the three, Raven Skyriver (Tlingit) draws deepest from the physical environment of the Pacific Northwest Coast. His incredibly life-like blown glass creatures are a celebration of the variety of aquatic and land animals of our region and beyond. He uses them to educate viewers about the ties we have to the creatures who have inhabited this land even longer than humanity, and the responsibility we owe them to keep the ecosystem healthy and sustained.