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Artworks
UNIDENTIFIED NUU-CHAH-NULTH or MAKAH ARTIST
Model Canoe with Two Figures, c. 1880-90cedar wood and trade pigment (Reckitt’s Blue), 5 x 24 x 5.75 in (12.7 x 61 x 14.6 cm)LOT 55
ESTIMATE: $6,000 — $9,000
PRICE REALIZED: $5,124.00Further images
Model canoes were a common production among Native carvers in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Nuu-chah-nulth and Makah carvers may have carved more than any other group, perhaps...Model canoes were a common production among Native carvers in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Nuu-chah-nulth and Makah carvers may have carved more than any other group, perhaps due to their proximity to numerous artifact markets. The most advanced model examples include human figures carved all of a piece with the canoe, as is the case here. In certain other models, the figures were added into the hull and pegged in place.
This example includes two human figures, each carved of a piece with the hull, their arms resting on the canoe gunwales and their faces looking straight ahead. The canoe itself is in the traditional form of those employed in seal hunting, with an upturned bow and pronounced flares along the gunwales to turn off the waves encountered on the outer coast. The canoe represents very well the sleek and graceful characteristics of historical canoes.
Steven C. Brown
References: For a Nuu-chah-nulth or Makah canoe model with two similarly posed figures, c. 1880 see First Arts, 13 July 2021, Lot 18. For one c. 1860-80 see Steven C. Brown, Native Visions: Evolution in Northwest Coast Art from the Eighteenth through the Twentieth Century, (Seattle: Seattle Art Museum / Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, 1998), p. 65. For a similar canoe with three figures see Sotheby’s American Indian Art Auction, NY, May 2015, Lot 162.
Provenance
Important Private Collection, Pittsburgh, PA.
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