RAMM: World Cultures - Americas

This is an ongoing exhibition

There are two world culture rooms at the museum and this one divides the Americas into four types of community.  These are Pacific Rim, Northwest Coast, Subarctic and Northeast Woodlands and lastly, Plains and Southwest USA.  It's easy to walk in to this room and see a few large striking objects, such as the kayaks and the lovely totem pole, and completely miss some of the delightful, but tiny objects.  There are so many objects in this case, that most people find themselves browsing, because there is just so much to see.  This one room took me a long time to go through to try and focus and absorb it's contents.

There is no one right way to enjoy a museum and I know my way is a little unusual.  Part of me really enjoys being thorough, feeling like I have completed something, like completing a list.  It's not the same part that has a brain that won't stop till it's exhausted and craves new things.  I can browse with the best of them, but I am conscious of how much I don't see or understand when I do this.  The Americas room is a good example of this.  Many of the objects I enjoyed the most were not immediately eye catching as they were not large and colourful.  The tiny details carved in to some of the smaller things were just amazing.

It's a tricky thing, looking at a great collection of historical items from the Americas.  The history of what happened to these tribes at the hands of western people is not happy reading and abuse has continued until recently in the form of forced removal of children and residential schools with attempts to eradicate their indigenous culture.  It would be easy to argue that not only are the effects of this treatment continuing to affect indigenous people across America but that there are new ways of denying them equality and fair treatment.  Indigenous women, for instance are especially vulnerable to abuse and many disappear, likely trafficked or murdered.  There are still reserves with no reliable fresh drinking water.

Any accurate reading of the history of the Americas does not paint western colonization in a good light.  Many lives were lost and with many tribes having their own society, stories, skills etc, so much knowledge was lost.  It's clear, that these indigenous peoples managed their lands in a much more sustainable way and knew how to keep the land balanced.  For instance, their fire management techniques helped reduce the risk of large scale fires.  Western people massacred animals and made some extinct and brought others to brink of extinction.  For instance the Passenger Pigeon was once the most plentiful bird in Northern America, numbering in the billions, before it was hunted to extinction by westerners.

Many items were collected by those involved in colonization.  Some were taken by force or stolen while others were taken in unfair treaties that were not honoured by the westerners who demanded them.  Some of the items are sacred to the people they once belonged to.  It is clear that this museum has an outstanding collection and there are undoubtedly items with a dubious background that should be repatriated.  This is very much something the museum is exploring and has been working with.

The most attention grabbing item in this gallery is a totem pole which is actually a contemporary item made for the museum by the Nuu-chah-nulth descendants of Chief Macquinna of Vancouver Island.  It was actually made to celebrate the relationship between the museum and this indigenous group which involved repatriation of items held by the museum in 1998.  At five metres high, it really dominates the space and I do think it's story sets a good tone for the gallery and items contained in it.

The process of repatriation is not simple.  Items have to have a clear claimant, as the museum can not be seen to give favour where there might be a competing claim.  The museum is clear that conservation of valuable items is a priority and they must be returned only to groups that can look after them in appropriate conditions that will preserve them.  If an agreement is made, actually transporting items can be a difficult process, involving complex paperwork and permissions.  For instance some American items might contain eagle feathers, which as an endangered species require additional paperwork to cross borders.

I must admit, knowing that some of the items I am viewing are undoubtedly valuable and possibly should not be in the UK, is very much on my mind when viewing a gallery like this.  I have no issue with items that are freely given as gifts being on display.  Or items that have been offered up for sale to tourists or as art pieces, but the disrespectful removal of cultural treasures is just hard for me.  The collection at RAMM is just of such a high quality, it's hard to believe that some of the items are not lost cultural treasures.  At least though, the museum does have a policy for repatriation and is conducting this work in the most sensitive way they can.

I began with the Northwest coast.  This display was rich in items carved from wood and many were collected from the 1800s with some from the 1700s.  The display begins with a cedar bark waistcoat and a shaman's rattle, modern items both gifted to Graham Searle, a museum volunteer who became the keeper of the totem pole.  The next rattle was my favourite though, depicting a raven with a shaman flying on its back.  The raven has a frog in its mouth and the shaman has two more on their back.  There is also a kingfisher and the shaman and kingfisher connect via their tongues.  It's an incredibly intricate piece and would have been used by a chief while dancing.

the display continues with feasting dishes, spoons and bowls before moving on to weapons, such as bows and arrows and clubs, and tools, such as scrapers and an adze head.  A beautiful crest pipe from the Haida Nation shows intricate carvings but they have no specific meanings as this item would ahve been produced for tourists, even as early as the mid 1800s.  

There was some lovely model crest poles, what we might think of as totem poles, but are actually family crests.  Each of these is more modern and a reproduction a full size pole.  My favourite shows and eagle and a bear and was a gift to a retiring teacher in 1956 when they left a school in British Columbia, Canada.  It is a beautiful piece of art, decorated in a very distinctive style.

There were more tools, including fish hooks, which I found fascinating.  They were much larger than I would think of fish hooks being and had a very distinctive shape that I found attractive.  There was also artwork of a killer whale that was again modern and part of the totem pole process.  I honestly think that a collection of gifted items, tourist items, reproductions of older items and modern examples of art from different tribes would be just as fascinating.

Next were the display cases showing the Pacific Rim artifacts.  The change in focus was very clear, with clothing clearly refined for surviving in such challenging conditions.  The parka was developed to be a waterproof layer worn over a fur coat.  They were made of gutskin and tore easily so were frequently replaced, even though they took a month to make.  There were also fur boots on display.

There were a number of items carved from bone and this part of the display would appear as white bone shapes, unless you looked more closely.  Many of the dark speckles were actually tiny dark carvings across the surface of the objects.  Some of these things were so beautiful and I especially loved the carvings on the drill bows, which would have been used to start fires.

Another thing I was not expecting were the toys.  They would have taken a lot of time and skill to make.  There were some beautiful dolls, showing winter and summer clothing, made on Baffin Island in the early to mid 20th century.  There was a stunning carved dog sled, with a pack of dogs and the sled is loaded with seal furs and hunting implements.  There were model kayaks, possibly made as toys or for exchanges.  Some of these model kayaks were especially beautiful, such as 19th century Inuit one with sealskin stretched over a frame and a small figure wearing a parka.

It was nice to see some weaving implements in the display as well.  I was a little surprised to see some Japanese items too, but I can see how geographically and culturally, they belong here.

Next were items from the Plains and Southwest USA and I think their style is in many ways more familiar to us from western films.  The effects of trade were also very clear there was more beadwork on display for instance, which used European glass beads combined with traditional techniques.  I especially enjoy seeing jewellery and beadwork as they are particular interests of mine.

Small items were ceramic rather than carved wood or bone and thee was a lovely display of things.  My favourite of these was an animal effigy believed to be from the Acoma or Zuni Pueblo peoples depicting a mole.  The design work on all these pieces is absolutely lovely.

The last part of this section was for the Subartic and Northeast Woodlands.  There was a beautiful outfit of leggings and a coat from the Cree which included fringing, made with sinew stitching.  Quill wrapped thongs and tassels were added for decoration, along with painted panels and some leather cut outs on the leggings.  

Another thing I particularly enjoyed seeing were the octopus bags.  These are bags with eight 'legs' that hang from the bottom.  It's a completely new style to me.  Another coat featured wonderful shoulder decoration and a geometric panel across the bottom.  Apparently floral designs began to replace the geometric designs after the early 1800s.  There were more beaded items as well, including stunning bags and pouches.

There were two birchbark containers with stunning pictures across their surface.  The birchbark is embroidered with dyed moose hair.

I also had no idea that lacrosse was game played by the north eastern tribes.  There was a stick made with a sinew net.  This was a game that some people learnt at my school, but only those in the older age range, with some skill!  It is not an easy game at all.

I find it very hard to see some of these pieces and believe anyone could ever believe these peoples unsophisticated.  What might appear to be a primitive carved tool might actually be precisely engineered to fit a particular individuals hand.  There was a richness and diversity of culture across the continent that the western world world attempted to destroy, even as they sought to exploit it.  There are items in the collection that represent tribal symbolism and stories that no one now remembers.

The last three smaller displays look at the ways in which people made connections, how they adjusted to encounters with others and how people are trying to reclaim their identities in a today's world.

Connections contains a number of diverse objects, each connecting to a individual who acquired an object.  For instance, there were objects collected by those on early voyages of exploration.  Slowly these turned to people with business trading with different tribes, held positions within the colonies or owned plantations (and enslaved peoples).  It is known that some of the objects were acquired by grave robbing but others, it is less clear and we can only speculate based on their likely connections.  It is a cross section of the types of people who came to own items from the Americas and shows just how little is actually known about how some of them came to be here.

Encounters with others shows objects that demonstrate the effects of encountering other cultures.  Some show a merging of ideas while others were directly produced for people from other cultures.  I had no idea that Russians occupied the Aleutian Islands and parts of Alaska for a time and that their policy resulted in the local way of life being almost entirely lost.  A cap shows the Russian influence, while another shows Scottish influences imitating those worn by highland regiments and immigrants.  There was a lovely Mestizo dress which is the name of a culture that developed in Mexico from a shared Mayan and Spanish heritage.  There were also Guatemalen men's pinstripe trousers that show the influence of jeans with their zips, rivets and pockets. 

This display included many lovely items of clothing that showed so many different ways in which cultures had merged and influenced and how trade had allowed new possibilities.  It was not all clothing however with masks, stamps used for body painting, jewellery and so much more.

Lastly, there were a few items showing how traditional crafts and artistry are being preserved.  It may be sieves produced by the Mehinaku using traditional skills to preserve these methods and earn money selling them to tourists.  There was a modern example of a dancers dress.  Modern items such as a mousemat featuring imagery based on longheld traditions.  These items also included quotes from some indigenous people about their attitudes for the future survival of their cultures.

I hope I have managed to convey some of the incredible skill and beauty that is demonstrated in this gallery.  There is an incredible array of cultures and beliefs represented.  The underlying conversation around these objects is very much present, in all it's challenges, for those who wish to delve below a surface browse of interesting things.