Title: Northwest Coast art - Wikipedia
Headings: Northwest Coast art
Northwest Coast art
Contents
Distinguishing characteristics
History
Cultural appropriateness
Notable artists
Notable art historians and thinkers
See also
Notes
References
Further reading
External links

Content: since European contact, the Northwest Coast art style has increasingly been used in gallery-oriented forms such as paintings, prints and sculptures. Mary Ebbets Hunt - Chilkat blanket
Although highly conventionalized decorative design occurs all along the coast, to the south and north of this center the representational motive becomes progressively stronger. Krickeberg (1925: 144) characterizes this as a fresh naturalism to the south among the Kwakiutl, Nootka, and Salish and a certain relationship to Eskimo engraving and painting among the Tlingit to the north. The shift in emphasis is gradual - Bella Bella art, for example, has a close affinity to its Coast Tsimshian counterpart. Two-dimensional art of all these groups, however, is much more closely related than is their sculpture, especially among the northern tribes of Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian, and Bella Bella. Textile arts from the Northwest Coast include Chilkat weaving, Raven's Tail Weavings, Button Blankets, and elaborate ceremonial regalia using a range of materials. Three dimension art was created from many materials, notably wood. History
Tlingit twined basket tray, late 19th c., spruce root, American dunegrass, pigment, Cleveland Museum of Art
Prior to contact with Europeans, First Nations on the Northwest coast evolved complex social and ceremonial institutions, including the potlatch system, hereditary systems of rank and descent, ceremonial societies, and permanent villages. Social organization involved groups of kin, reckoned variously matrilineally, patrilineally or bi-lineally.