PORT TOWNSEND — To complement the James Swan exhibit at the Jefferson Museum, February’s First Friday Lecture by Robin Wright will be “Swan and the Haida: 19th Century Journeys” at 7 tonight.
Wright will explore Swan’s relationship with the Haida Native Americans, their art and his travels in the Queen Charlotte Islands in Port Townsend’s historic City Council chambers at 540 Water St. A donation of $5 is suggested.
Wright is emerita professor of art history at the University of Washington and curator of native American art at the Burke Museum.
She is the author of “Northern Haida Master Carvers,” “In the Spirit of the Ancestors,” “Charles Edenshaw” and “A Time of Gathering.”
In 1962, when she was in junior high, Wright’s father came to Seattle from Minnesota to pursue a post-doctorate degree at the University of Washington.
It was the year of the World’s Fair and an exhibit of Northwest Coast art so captivated her that she made it her life’s study.
She received a master’s degree and a doctorate in art history from the University of Washington.
She worked with 36 Washington tribes to create the State Centennial Exhibition, one of the first exhibits in the country to involve indigenous people telling their own stories.
Swan had a variety of careers: oysterman, customs inspector, land speculator, secretary to a congressional delegate, judge, natural historian, and ethnographer.
As a teacher in Neah Bay, he learned about Makah culture.
He wrote “The Indians of Cape Flattery” in 1869.
In 1874, he published a Smithsonian monograph of Haida designs and their meanings.
In 1883, on a trip to the Queen Charlotte Islands, he met master carver Charles Edenshaw and acquired the cane that is in the Jefferson County Historical Society collection.
