DOCUMENT RESUME

ED 343 732 RC 018 458

AUTHOR Roark-Calnek, SueTITLE The Algonquin World: Seasons, Cycles, Change. A Guide

to the Exhibition (Genaseo, New York, October18-November 2, 1991).

INSTITUTION BOCES Geneseo Migrant Center, Geneseo, NY.SPONS AGE/TCY New York State Council on the Arts, New York.PUB DATF 91

NOTE 22p.

PUB TYPE Guides - Non-Classroom Use (055) -- HistoricalMaterials (060)

EDRS PRICE MF01/PC01 Plus Postage.DESCRIPTORS *American Indian Culture; *American Indians; *Art;

*Cultural Activities; Cultural Education; *MigrantWorkers

IDENTIFIERS *Algonquin (Tribe)

ABSTRACTThis exhibit guide summarizes interpretive texts from

the exhibition of Algonquin arts and craftwork assembled by the FolkArts Program of the BOCES Geneseo Migrant Center in western New York.The Algonquin people migrate to fur farms near East Bloomfield andHolcomb, New York for fall pelting from late October throughDecember. The image of the turtle in the exhibition represents theAlgonquin creation story in which the etrth is formed on the back ofa great turtle. Algonquin life follows a seasonal rhythm of dispersaland aggregation, which also Influences the production of Algonquincrafts. Winter is a time for knowing the ways of the ice and snow,making snowshoes and fur rcbez, and gathering for old feasts and newholidays. Spring is a time for tapping the maple trees for syrup,working with wood, and preparing for :lhe spring hunt. Summer is atime for traveling by water, making canoes, setting nets, tanninghides, and displaying needlecrafts. Autumn is a time for going to thefur farms, setting traps for martens, beavers, and foxes, taking thebark from birch trees for baskets, and calling the moose. In thecycles of life each stage has its time, its tasks, and itsceremonies. Childhood is a time for learning by watching, listening,playing, practicing, and participating. Adulthood is a time forgetting married and working together. The role of elders is to sharewisdom and bear tradition. Changes in Algonquin life include the furtrade, fur farms, and threats to native lands. The guide provider.;bLef biographies of seven visiting artists. (KS)

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The ALGONQUIN WorldSeasons, Cycles, Change

October 18 November 2, 1991Bertha V.B. Lederer Gallery

State University of New York at Geneseo

A Guide to the Exhibition

by

Sue Roark-Calnek, Ph.D., Curator

Folk Arts ProgramLiving ston-Steub en-Wy um ingBOCES Geneseo Migrant Center

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We gratefully acknowledge the help of many people whomade this exhibit possible. They include:

The New York State Council on the Arts/Folk Arts and SpecialArts Services Programs for their financial support of theexhibit and the Wyoming County Council on the Arts, whichserves as the conduit for funding.

Carl Shanahan, the Exhibit Designer, and Jan Jackson, Di-

rector of the Bertha V.B. Lederer Gallery. Both are faculty inthe Art Department, SUNY Geneseo.

Bob Lynch, Director of the BOCES Geneseo Migrant Center,Sylvia Kelly, Coordinator of the Center's CAMPS/Folk ArtsProgram, and Pat Crowley, Director of the Bloomfield Mi-grant Tutorial Program, for their efforts on behalf of mi-grant farmworkers. Bob Lynch gave permission for theexhibit's use of materials from the Migrant Heritage StudiesProject, Algonquin Component.

Russell Judkins, Chair of the Anthropology Department,SUNY Geneseo, whose support for the Algonquin research isgreatly appreciated. The exhibit is the first of a series ofevents in the Native American Festival cosponsored by theDepartment and College Activities, SUNY Geneseo.

Michael Teres and Dan Fink, also faculty in the Art Depart-ment, SUNY Geneseo, for facilitating the Workshop in Pho-tography by Michael Greenlar.

Tom Matthews, Coordinator of College Activities, and DougLippincott, Director of Communications at SUNY Geneseo, forpublicity for the exhibit.

Jeanne Stearns, nurse with the BOCFS Geneseo MigrantCenter, who has long had personal telationships with the

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Algonquin families in Rapid Lake and who first opened thedoors for me in Canada.

Mary Fink and Anne Salerno, staff members of the BOCESGeneseo Migrant Center, who gave generously of their timeto help with many details of the exhibit.

Denise Haywood, who helped with public relations an0 cata-log layout; Juan Huerta, who photographed the Center'sAlgonquin pieces and mounted the community map; KarenHabberfield, who constructed that map in 1?90; and ErikaTomasi, who mounted photo montages and pattern displa;sfor the exhibit, all present or former SUNY Geneseo students.

Ray Mayo, who lesigned the exhibit poster, and Ron Pretzer,who printed photographs from Migrant Heritage StudiesProject slides. Both are on the staff of the InstructionalResources Center at SUNY Geneseo.

Pill Hartwell of B&D Productions. Oswego, New York. whoprinted Michael Green lar's photographs.

The Office of the Provost, SUNY Geneseo, for supporting theOpening Reception.

Varrick Chittenden, for his helpful review of the exhibit'sconceptual design.

Jean Pentinio, Principal of the Rapid Lake School, for theloan of "The Pike and the Stuigeon," and Laurie Jacobs \Va-.watie, a teacher at Rapid Lake, for facilitating arrangementsfor the visiting artists.

Allan Saxby, former owner of Saxby Farm, East Bloomfield,New York, who in 1976 contributed reminiscences of Algon-quin migrancy to the Migrant Heritage Studies Project,Algonquin Component.

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Cathy Reinholtz and Freda Hark, Art and Anthropology De-parttnent Secretaries, for their patience and help.

The Hudson's Bay Company Archives, Manitoba ProvincialArchives, Winnipeg, Manitcba, for permission to use textsfrom the records of the Cabonga and Barriere Posts in theexhibit,

The Canadian Ethnology Service, Canadian Museum of Exhibi-tion, whose photographs of Barriere Lake elders at the Al-gonquin Artifacts Documentation Project appear in theexhibit.

The Photographic Archives, Museum of the American Indian(1Ieye Foundation), New York, for prints from its negatives ofcanoe building at Barriere Lake in 1929.

The Band Council and community of the Algonquins of Barri-ere Lake at Rapid Lake, Quebec, for allowing me to live andlearn among them during a sabbatical in 1989-1990 and onmany previous and subsequent shorter visits. My first visitsto the community were on behalf of the BOCES Geneseo Mi-grant Center's Folk Arts Program, and resulted In our firstexhibitions of Algonquin arts, at East B.00mfield in 1987 andat the Native American Center for the Living Arts (TheTurtle) in Niagara Falls, New York, in 1988.

All my teachers and friends, Algonquin people at the furfarms and at Barriere Lake. First among them are the visit-ing artists, who have so patiently, and for so long, sharedsome of their wisdom, their skills, and their lives. I havetried humbly to learn their ways of listening and looking,and they will recognize and correct my mistakes. kitcImlgwetc.

Sue Roark-CainekExhibit Curator

INTRODUCTION

In the Algonquin world, there is a time for everypurpose and a purpose for every time; all things comearound as the circle turns. Season follows season; lifeunfolds through the cycle of birth to death.

Seasons in nature and cycles of life repeat. Theyprovide continuity of experience within generations,between generations. In the Algonquin world, there isnow also rapid and unsettling change: new challengesto old purposes, new purposes to define.

Algonquin arts and craftwork can be understoodin this context of time They are rooted in seasons,transmitted in cycles, and subject to change. Thisguide draws on interpretive texts from the exhibitionto develop the themes of seasons, cycles and change.Most of the pieces presented in the exhibition are inthe permanent collection of the BOCES Geneseo Mi-grant Center's Folk Arts Program; others are on loanfrom members of the Barriere Lake Algonquin com-munity, Robert Lynch, and Sue Roark-Calnek.

THE ALGONQUIN WORLD

Time and Space...There are ten communities ofAnicinthek (Algonquin people) in Western Quebecand Ontario. Among them is the I3arriere Lake bandnow settled on a small reserve at Rapid Lake, Quebec.

Many Barriere Lake Algonquins still hunt widely overtheir land. They have a close knowledge of the bush,

observing a relationship with it, at once spiritual andpractical, which they cal! "respect." The artisan's craftdraws on this relationship, and on the discipline itdemands.

Seasonal employment in the fur industry makes useof traditional skills. Since the mid-1940s, Algonquinshave come to fur farms near East 13loomfield andIlolcomb, New York, for the fall pelting, from lateOctober through December.

_Space and TimeThe Algonquin cosmos can be represented in anotherway. In the traditional Algonquin creation story, theearth is formed on the back of a great turtle. NorthAmerica itself has the shape of "Turtle Island," laidout in four directions that also form a circle. Theplates on a turtle's shell are a calendar. The image ofthe turtle presented in the exhibition thus connectsspace and time.

. SEASONS TIMES FOR_

- ...Meeting and PartingAlgonquin life has longfollowed a seasonal rhythmof dispersal and aggrega-tion. Families and theirfriends have traveled theland, coming together formeetings and seasonalfeasts at traditional rendez-vous points. Seasonal feastsrenew the social community

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as well as the bond between the people and theirenvironment. They mark the times of coming and

going, working and playing the seasons of themoose, when the sap runs, when the ice forms on theshore, when the ducks return, when medicine plantscan be gathered, when bark can be taken.

...Making and Using Seasonal rhythms also informthe production of Algonquin crafts. There are appro-priate times for using an object, and times (not neces-sarily the same) for making it - when the bark can bescratched, when a hide can be smoked.

Winter A Time for._....Knowing the Ways of the Ice and SnowThe winter has its own purposes setting a net orline under the ice for fish, hunting moose on themountain, cutting firewood to keep warm. For a

people who travel upon waterways, winter is a timeto pass on the ice, once by dogsled, now by snowmo-bile. The wise traveler who respects the ice knowswhere and when to pass safely.

...Walking Through the Bush like a Rabbit Likethe feet of a snowshoe hare, a snowshoe supports and

spreads a traveler's weight on the snow. Yellow birch

or ash frames are bent, then netted with babiche cut

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from wet moosehide in very long, very thin stripsand coiled. Babiche must be pulled before netting totest its strength. Three different widths are requiredto net a snowshoe.

Winter-phase hares are snared and their skins cutspirally into long, thin strips. Spun and twined with awooden needle, many skins make a robe that trapswarm air in the fur.

...Dancing with the People Winter is also a timefor festive gatherings old seasonal feasts and newholidays. At the Feast of the Three Kings (Epiphany),dancers wear bright, patterned socks decorated withyarn tassels. Socks are knitted in winter and wornpulled up over pants and boot tops for display.

Winter is also a time for storytelling and play. ThenAbwan is a ring-and-pin game in which birch ringsor moose knuckles are swung and impaled uponspikes.

Spring A Time for....Goings and Comings Spring comes late to thebush. New life stirs; the maple sap runs; the ducksreturn. As the ice retreats irom the shore, waterwaysopen. The spring feast celebrates the renewal of lifeand prepares for the spring hunt.

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...Sharing the Gift of the Maple The rising of

maple sap marks the coming of spring. Traditionally,maple trees were tapped with an axe; yellow birchwedges directed the sap to bark buckets. The sap is

boiled down in huge pots for syrup, taffy, and sugar.The first maple tree tapped may be tied with a redcloth as a reminder that ininAtik (the maple) sharesher life's blood with the people.

...Working with Wood Like the Beaver Thesugarbush camp is a good time and place to workwith wood. Snowshoe frames are bent, and wood iscarved or whittled with axes and crooked knives

Jacob Wawatie has produced elegant carvings of ani-mals in his world moose, bears, and beavers. Theyfit form to function. The elongated legs of the mooseserve as stanchions for display panels; the beavergnaw their stanchions.

Summer A Time for._...Knowing the Ways of the Water and LandSummer is a time for traveling about by water, a timewhen the days are long and warm and the bush is agreen garden of medicine plants.

_Making Canoes and Setting Nets Some elders

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keep alive the art of the birch bark canoe, and sum-mer is its season. Like a full sized canoe, the modelcanoe is made by staking, clamping, and weightingbark around a shaping rrame. Cedar sheathing andribs are set in. The canoe is sewn with spruce rootsand sealed with white spruce gum. A scallop decora-tion may be scratched or painted under the gunwales.The rim scallop can be found also on birch bark bas-kets.

From a canoe, nets can be set. Traditional netmakingused a wooden shuttle and mesh gauge.

...Tanning Ilides for Moccasins and Mitts Tra-ditionally, tanned moosehides are soaked andscraped, stretched and beaten when wet until soft,then smoked with aged wood to beautiful browns.Commercially tanned deerhide is now also used forAlgonquin leatherwork moccasins sewn with finepuckered stitching, gauntleted mitts and fingeredgloves.

...Displaying the Craft of the Needle Fine sew-ing is an enduring Algonquin craft, although tools andmaterials have changed. Long ago, a sewing kit mightinclude the penis bones of martens and minks, awls,and "muscle line" or moosehair thread; today's sewingkit has steel needles, embroidery floss, and glassbeads.

Traditional floral patterns are applied to leather inembroidery or beadwork. These recall the plants thatnourish animal, and thus human, life. Many patternsshow a symmetrical "double curve" motif.

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Autumn A Time for

__Comings and Goings As autumn comes to thebush, the open water of summer gives way to the ice.Geese pass overhead, going south. Animal peltsthicken; birch bark changes. People hold a fall feastand ready themselves for the time of cold. Late au-tumn is also when people go to the fur farms in theStates.

...Going Trapping Setting traps for martens, beaver,or fox requires careful study of their habits. Oncetaken, skins are stretched for later sale or use. Indiantrapping neither sentimentalizes animals nor reducesthem to "things". In traditional Algonquin thinking,an animal whose ways and remains are treated withrespect will offer itself to be taken. And what isoffered should not be wasted.

....Taking the Bark from the Birch for BasketsBark when stripped from the tree in the fall can bedecorated by scratching down through the dark rindto expose a lighter layer. Design stencils cut fromthin bark or brown paper are laid on the vessel andscratched around with a small knife. Floral designsare older than representational designs.

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Algonquin baskets are sewn with awls and jackpineor spruce roots. Their forms depend on purpose,from simple utility containers to the elegant feastdishes. The storage basket makes a fine sewing orlunch box.

...Calling the Moose In the fall mating season, askillful hunter "calls" moose through a rolled cone ofbirch bark. The call may be stitched with roots andmay be scratch-decorated, or quickly improvisedwith tape.

CYCLES TIMES FOR......Making the Circles In the circles and cycles oflife, every stage has its time, its tasks, and its cere-monies. All stages should be interdependent, recog-nizing and respecting what each has to give.

Children A Time for Learning...

...By Watching and Listening Algonquin child-hood has two stages. A baby learns how to learn,developing listening and looking skills. A newbornbaby may be laid in a hide and bark carrier beforebeing tied in an upright tikinAgan or cradleboard.

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The tikinAgan faces the baby out from the mothertoward the world. Stood upright, it provides eyecontact with what's going on. Clamshell rattles andother objects can be hung from the headbrace toa use the child.

Carriers and cradleboards are usually decorated, withburned-wood or scratched-bark designs. In contrast,the memebizin or baby swing is simple and whollyfunctional in construction, quickly fashioned fromthings at hand and suitable for hanging anywhere,indoors or out.

Children A Time for Learning....

...By Play, Practice, Participation Girls and boysmove toward marriage by mastering the skills re-quired for a couple's survival. Play still teaches les-sons about life. Ring-and-pin games develop hand-eye coordination and counting skills. Cats-cradletrains the fingers and eye in complex visual patterns.By practicing marksmanship on a partridge, a childprepares to hunt. Participation in feasts teachesspiritual and social values.

Men & Women a TimeFor...

...Coming Together Traditional Algonquin mar-riages were arranged by families when a couple couldhave children, feed and clothe them. Contemporaryweddings integrate Algonquin customs with Catholic

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ritual. The community feasts with the families. Inone recent wedding, a bark canoe fetched the bride; agift canoe held other gifts.

...Working Together The strength of a marriagehas been in working together. Men's and women'sroles should be complementary, each providing sup-port for the other. Gender roles are not rigid.Women hunt and trap when they must, when theywish. Men can cook, and some knit socks. Anyoneshould be able to make an axe handle, the tool withwhich one can make everything needed to survive inthe bush.

Grandmothers and Grandfathers - A Time for...

__Sharing Wisdom Elders have passed through theseasons and cycles of life. Older women wear thetraditional cloth dress, decorated with ribbontrim. Elders teach, by example and advice; in turn,they should receive help and respect from youngerpeople.

....Bearing Tradition Oral traditions transmitted byelders explain the origins of the Algonquin world andcontain lessons for everyday life. One such traditionis "The Pike and the Sturgeon", told with the bones inthe head of a pikefish.

CHANGE TIMES FOR_

...Old Roads, New Turnings Change has come to

the Algonquin .rld, to the people and the land itself.There are new shorelines, new roads, new points of

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connection with theoutside. The recenthistory of the Algon-quin people is punctu-ated by events andplaces the fur trade,the fur farm, the re-serve, the protest. Itis also mirrored intheir arts.

....New Branches,Old Roots. Today'sAlgonquin artistsproduce work for sale

%as well as for use.

41114 my inuttio0 They are nourished bythe land and tradition.

They also explore new materials, techniques, styles.Contemporary beadwork is applied to keychains,watchbands, and jewelry. Beaders also work materi-als from the bush porcupine quills, beaver teeth,bear claws - into their ornaments. A stretched hideor a T-shirt can serve as a canvas.

...The Fur Trade At trading posts, Algonquins sup-plied the traders with furs, snowshoes, canoes, andthe skills needed to survive in the bush. From thetraders, Algonquins received steel traps and guns,knife and axe blades, fiddles, wool socks, and stepdancing, flour and spirits, yard goods and beads,plaids for cradleboard covers. Texts from Iludson'sBay Company records show us Algonquin people astraders saw them.

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_The Fur Farms Algonquins migrate seasonallyfrom Canada to fur farms near East Bloomfield andHolcomb, New York. Fur farm work killing, skin-ning, and skiving (defleshing) is an alternative tofall trapping. It repeats the traditional pattern ofseasonal dispersal, and draws on skills which servedAlgonquins well during the fur trade. The organiza-tion of the workplace is very different from the bushor the trading post. Someone else is the boss. Fromthe migrant experience, Algonquins have acquirednew technologies, styles, and tastes.

The 1976 reminiscences of Allan .;axby recall earlyAlgonquin migrancy from an East Bloomfield minkfar mer's point of view.

...The Reserve A map showing past and presentlocations of Barriere Lake Algonquin people accompa-nies an account of their settlement at Rapid Lake.The present 59-acre reserve provides housing andcommunity services for 450 people. Communitymembers also maintain campsites or cabins in thesurrounding bush, their traditional land use area.Much of this area is now contained within La Veren-drye Park, a Provincial Wildlife Reserve.

__The Protest This land use area has been threat-ened by competing demands for its resources by non-Native interests. La Verendrye has been opened tosport hunting in moose and bear seasons. Loggershave clear-cut much of the forest. In 1989 and 1990,the community mobilized to defend its traditionalland, with a blockade of logging roads and the high-way. A recent agreement promises to recognize Al-

gonquin interests in developing a joint land use strat-

egy. Meanwhile, people watch and wait.

WINDOWS ON TUE ALGONQUIN WORLD...

...Anicinitbe means "Algonquin" Photographyand videography are windows on other worlds, else-where and elsewhen. The camera and camcorder can

document continuities from the past to preserve them

for the future. These wonderful devices, "the suncaptured in a box", also open windows on anotherworld for the Native peoples of the Canadian North.

We look in on their world; through the medium oftelevision they look in on ours. The show closes with

a video display of contemporary Barriere Lake life.

...Anicinibe Also Means "Human" Season followsseason; the cycles of life repeat. History moves onThe choices that 13arriere Lake people make aboutroads for their future will affect our lives, as our

choices affect theirs. With understanding, perhaps,

we can both choose to walk separately, together. The

Algonquin world is a window on our world.

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Visiting Artists

Helene (Lena) Jerome Nottaway was born about 1914in the bush near Rapid Lake, Quebec. She was em-ployed for many years as a seasonal migrant farm-worker at Saxby Fur Far m, East Bloomfield, New York.She is a traditional elder and midwife in the BarriereLake Algonquin community, and, with her daughterIrene Jerome, is widely regarded among Algonquinpeople as a notable producer and teacher of tradi-tional crafts. She has been a mentor in traditionalculture for the Migizi Cultural School at Rapid Lake,and has shared her craft as a bark basket maker withyoung students at the Rapid Lake School. Pieces byher are in the Collections of the Canadian EthnologyService, Canadian Museum of Civilization.

Irene Jerome was born in 1937 in the bush nearRapid Lake. She has also been a seasonally migrantfar mworker at Saxby Fur Farm. She has been aninstructor in traditional crafts for the former Kiti-ganik Pakiganekisan Crafts Association at Rapid Lake.With her mother, she has taught bark basket makingto children at the Rapid Lake School and has men-tored students from the Migizi Cultural School intraditional culture. She has recently worked with

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Vermont Abenakis in a revival of birch bark basket-making. Her work is 30 represented in the Collec-tions of the Canad., Ethnology Service, CanadianMuseum of

Jacob Wawatie was.born in 1956 at Rapid Lake. Hetoo has worked seasonally at Saxby Fur Farm. Ile hastaught and developed curriculum in Algonquin tradi-tional culture and language for the Rapid Lake School,

has been a mentor in traditional culture for the Mizigi

Cultural School at Rapid Lake, and is an instructor inAlgonquin language studies for Native teachers,McGill University's Native Teacher Certification Pro-

gram.

Jaimie Wawatie was born in 1981 at Maniwaki. Sheis the daughter of Jacob and Laurie Jacobs Wawatie,and is a student at the Rapid Lake School.

Lena Nottaway, Irene Jerome, and Jacob Wawatiehave demonstrated traditional crafts at the annualFirst Nations Education Conferences at Trois-Rivières,Quebec, and at the Native American Center for theLiving Arts (The Turtle) Niagara Falls, New York in1988. Irene Jerome and Lena Nottaway were Consult-

ants for the Canadian Museum of Civilization (Cana-

dian Ethnology Service) Algonquin Artifacts Docu-

mentation Project, January 1991. Jacob Wawatie andIrene Jerome have also reviewed the Algonquin col-lections at the Museum of the American Indian, IleyeFoundation, in 1989 with the staff of the Museum'sResearch Branch,

Josephine Poucachiche Vazquez was born at RapidLake in 1949. She came to Western New York as aseasonal far mworker and "settled out" on an area furfarm after her marriage to William Vazquez, a PuertoRican far.mworker.

Michael Greenlar is a professional photographerbased in Syracuse, NY. He has an A.A. in audiovisualtechnology from Monroe Community College and aB.A. in journalism from St. John Fisher College, andwas formerly a staff photographer with Syracusenewspapers. In addition to his work with Algonquinpeople, Mr. Greenlar has done photojournalism anddocumentation projects on migrant farmworkers inCentral and Western New York, apartheid in SouthAfrica, and charcoal burners in Ilaiti. His photographshave appeared in Life, Time, Newsweek, and the NewYork Times Sunday Magazine.

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Office of. EducationalResearch and Improvement (0ERI)

rI

Date FilmedAugust 8, 1992