Art And Soul Cheney Cowles Museum Reaches Into Its Treasure Of Native American Art To Present Striking, Definitive Exhibit

Every thing has a soul. Every rock, tree, animal, person.

That’s the philosophy of Lynn Pankonin, curator of the exhibit “From Earth & Sky: Indian Art of the Americas,” which opens Sunday at the Cheney Cowles Museum.

If true, Pankonin has been in touch with 36,000 “souls” in the process of selecting 350 of them for the show, which is as important to the museum as the Dutch Masters or Greek and Roman art exhibits.

The winnowing process was painful, Pankonin said. Next to impossible. Such a rich variety of material to select from, to tell the story of Native Americans. Every item is cherished, and Pankonin wanted the exhibit to be as all-encompassing as possible.

What she culled for the exhibit, which runs through Jan. 4, will be representative of Indian art and artifacts from Mexico to the Arctic, from one coast of the United States to the other.

And all 36,000 objects are owned by the museum.

When Cheney Cowles inherited material from the Museum of Native American Cultures (MONAC) in 1991 and combined it with what was already owned, the result was “a collection of national significance, not just a small museum in a midsized city in the northeast part of Washington,” said Glenn Mason, museum director.

“It elevated us to owning one of the most significant collections anywhere,” Mason added.

And Pankonin has created a catalog that will let the rest of the world know about the jewel that’s here. Now tribes and historians from across America will know where to turn for valuable research information.

But first, much more space is needed. Right now, there isn’t enough room to properly spread out the Native American collection to examine all that is available for the show, let alone extend that privilege to individual researchers.

Currently there is no room to study items; no research location; no library facility for the museum’s extensive library.

So, “From Earth & Sky” is being used to kick off the $19.6 million capital campaign for a new building, the curator said. Washington state granted $1.2 million for design work on an addition, and the rest will come from a mixture of public and private money.

It’s hoped the new museum will open its doors in the spring of 2001, Mason said.

Few Inland Northwest residents know very much about Native Americans, Mason said. He’s hoping the exhibit will help fill that information gap.

He thinks growing interest in indigenous people will help draw a crowd to “From Earth & Sky” that will be comparable to the museum’s other major shows.

Viewers will see pieces of pre-Colombian art from 300 B.C. to artwork of contemporary Native Americans, and everything between.

Pankonin and Mason deliberately included acrylic artwork of Ric Gendron of the Colville Confederated Tribes “to let people know that (the Indian) culture is still alive, still going on today,” Mason said.

“It’s different from before, but the culture is still alive.”

While art and artifacts come from all over, the collection is especially strong with items from the Plateau district, an area from the Frazier River in Canada to the Blue Mountains in Oregon, and from the Rockies to the Casades - the area within a 200-mile radius of Spokane.

Besides offering a physical representation, the Plateau pieces represent a cultural distinction.

Pankonin and Mason hope visitors will come to know a bit more about the area’s ancients and their descendents.

Another lesson to be learned by observers is distinguishing art and artifacts of one area from another. When people hear the word Indian, they tend to think generically, Mason said.

This collection will depict the difference in various native groups, and tribal differences within those groups.

There are some similarities of artwork, however, Mason said.

For instance, the stylized figures woven into Apache baskets have some characteristics of figures found in the Columbia area.

Pankonin is especially fond of the exceptional beading by Plateau tribespeople. She gently held up an Apache purse as an example.

In addition to its intricate beadwork, attached strings of metal chimes sing sweetly when they’re moved. The melodious chimes are fashioned from the unlikely source of snoose-can tops.

It’s Pankonin’s “sanity purse,” she said, something she rings to instill calmness during these hectic days of piecing the show together.

A popular section at “From Earth & Sky” will no doubt be the Mexican masks that display realistic likenesses of Spanish priests and abstract similarities of diablo - devil - masks, which Pankonin said have become her “best friends.”

Also displayed will be traditional baskets, dresses and baby boards; a walrus skull and tusks adorned with turquoise, bear claws and silver; and a magnificent necklace fashioned from silver dollars and dimes.

There will be arctic ivory tusks made into a pipe, a cribbage board, and other ivory pieces with fine paintings detailing the story of a hunt.

A three-footed bowl made by an artist who might have lived 200 years before Christ will be exhibited, along with other beautiful pre-Colombian items.

One of Pankonin’s favorite pieces is not made of fine beadwork, nor is it a statue of a noble person, or even something a noble person once owned.

Rather, it’s a Plateau basket, a rather plain basket. But Pankonin likes to think of the person who used it to gather berries and roots. It holds evidence of both.

She likes to think of that person’s hands working with it until the bottom of the basket changed in color.

She likes to visualize, personalize the pieces.

Both Pankonin and Mason hope exhibit visitors will gain a sense of that relationship.

When people look at the objects, they want them to gain a sense of another person, the person who owned it or crafted it or used it.

“We want to use the stuff of history to bring people together,” Mason said.

“On the one hand, the show is of beautiful objects, but we hope people will take a couple of steps beyond that.”

The show’s title - “From Earth & Sky” - says it all, Pankonin said. Everything comes from the earth and sky: The earth provides material for pottery, food, the whole life cycle; and birds of the air figure predominantly in oral histories.

“And man lives in between,” she said.

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MEMO: Two sidebars appeared with the story: 1. Exhibit hours “From Earth & Sky: Indian Art of the Americas” will be open to the public from Sunday through Jan. 4. Admission is included in regular museum admission: $4 for adults, $3 for seniors, $2.50 for students and children 6-16, and children under age 6 are free. Admissions on Wednesdays are half price from 10 a.m.-5 p.m. and free from 5-9 p.m. For special group and tour rates, or to make group reservations, call 456-3931, ext. 123. The Cheney Cowles Museum is at 2613 W. First. Hours are 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Wednesdays; and 1-5 p.m. Sundays.

2. Programs will relate to exhibit Extensive programming will accompany the exhibition of “From Earth & Sky: Indian Art of the Americas” during its three months at the Cheney Cowles Museum. Included the first week will be: Sunday: The exhibit opens to the public. Wednesday: Salish language and culture class, 4-6 p.m. “The Plains Indian and Their Traditional Arts,” a lecture by Richard Conn, curator emeritus for the Denver Art Museum, 7:30 p.m. Next Friday: “They Dance Among the Stars: American Indian and the Night Sky” at the Eastern Washington University Planetarium, 7-8:30 p.m. Oct. 4: FamilyFest with Anita Cheer (Colville Tribes), demonstrating basketry, 11 a.m.-1 p.m.; Pauline Flett (Spokane Tribe), storyteller, 11:15 a.m.-noon and 12:15-1 p.m.; Robbie Paul (Nez Perce Tribe) storyteller, 1-3 p.m. Oct. 5: Anita Cheer, basketry, and Stephen Noyes (Colville), sculptor, 2-4 p.m. Other scheduled events will be: Children’s FamilyFests - 11 a.m.-2 p.m. first Saturdays of the month, October to December; to feature hands-on activities, with some presented by Spokane Children’s Museum. Wednesday Night Free Programs - For eight weeks (Oct. 1-Nov. 19), there will be artists and lecturers from Denver, Virginia, Los Angeles, Nespelem, Wash., Olympia and elsewhere. Saturdays and Sundays - 21 programs of Indian people performing or demonstrating crafts and arts. Day of the Dead Celebration - Oct. 31-Nov. 2; visitors will learn and participate in a Hispanic holiday custom. Winter Friendship Dance - Jan. 3, noon; East Central Community Center; dances and songs of Spokane Indian Tribe. “According to Coyote” - Jan. 3, 7 p.m., a one-person play by Carlotta Kauffman (Nez Perce), plus other area American Indian performers. Evening Family Walks at Turnbull Wildlife Refuge - Oct. 12-18. Salish Language/Culture Class - 4-6 p.m. every Wednesday starting Oct. 1.