Speaker mask. Bright blue paint around eyes and bridge of nose, black paint markings on forehead, cheeks, nose and lips. Fur attached to brow and chin.
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Hayak´anT´alał

Speaker

Catalogue Information

Provenance

Owned by Sam Charlie until its forced surrender to Indian Agent William Halliday on March 25, 1922. Halliday later displayed and photographed the seized pieces at the Parish Hall in Alert Bay. After doing an inventory, he crated the items in June, and at the end of September he shipped some of them to the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, on long-term loan from the National Museum of Man (now the Canadian Museum of History). They remained in the possession of the ROM until the NMM pulled its loan and returned the pieces to the Nuyumbalees and U'mista cultural societies in 1988. In 1995 Sam Charlie's daughter, Mary Beans (nee Charlie) requested her father's regalia be transferred from Nuyumbalees to U'mista for display.

Materials

Wood; Hide; Paint; Metal

Dimensions

28.0 cm x 21.0 cm x 15.0 cm

Accession Number

95.03.007

Physical Description

Humanoid face mask carved from a single piece of wood, overall there is a white base paint with eye sockets painted blue, which extends across the bridge of the nose. Each eye is delineated with black circles. There is black scalloping on each cheek. The eyebrows, moustache and possibly a goatee (now covered with hide) are painted black. The outline of the nares painted black and each nostril, which are uncarved, is red as are the lips. Bits of skin are nailed onto the chin and forehead.