The decision to carve a totem pole didn’t come easy. I had worked on others totem poles, three to be exact. One was with my old master Henry Green and the second was with my friend Lyle Campbell. While working on their totem poles I felt it was too much work and I told them so. They both told me it would be different when I worked on my own totem pole, they were right. My first totem pole wasn’t a commission; I didn’t think “I want to carve a totem pole, what should I carve?” I wanted to tell a story and a totem pole was the best way to tell it.
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How do you erect it?
ReplyDeleteIt depends on the totem pole, if it were for say my tribe or a village then there would be a feast(Nisga'a ceremony). If it were a commission then the buyer would decide what sort of ceremony to do. This totem is something I've done for the experience of carving a totem pole so while I've had a little party to celebrate finishing of the pole, I've yet to find a location to place the pole.
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