[Bill] Reid was instrumental in introducing to the world the great art traditions of the Indigenous peoples of the Northwest Coast of North America.

—Martine J. Reid

Over his distinguished career, Iljuwas Bill Reid became renowned for working in diverse media. He created pieces ranging from the smallest scale, such as exquisite gold jewellery, to the monumental. His large-scale bronze work Spirit of Haida Gwaii: The Black Canoe, commissioned for the Canadian Embassy in Washington, DC, has been called “the largest, most complex, and best known of Bill Reid’s sculptures.”

Spirit of Haida Gwaii brings together a crew of more than a dozen animated figures in a canoe: mythical Haida beings that include the Raven, the Wolf, the Eagle, and the Frog, plus several humans. When the sculpture was first cast by the Tallix Foundry in 1991, Reid chose to also cast two images from it as stand-alone sculptures, namely Bear Mother and Dogfish Woman. Of these nine smaller sculptures, only three pairs were cast in black patina to resemble argillite, the traditional carving stone for Haida artists.

With its finely rendered facial details and lustrous black patina, the head of Bear Mother, one of the three humans aboard Spirit of Haida Gwaii, has its own sense of monumentality. That this head forms part of Reid’s late-career masterpiece tells its own special story.

Spirit of Haida Gwaii: The Black Canoe was installed in the Canadian Embassy’s courtyard in 1991. A second casting, finished with a green patina (The Jade Canoe), was cast in 1993 and subsequently installed at the Vancouver International Airport. The sculpture’s original plaster cast (1988) can be viewed at the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, Quebec.

Please note the work rests on a custom cedar base which measures 36 1/2 x 20 x 21 inches.

Please note that given the weight of this work, excess shipping fees may apply. Please contact Heffel Vancouver for a shipping quote or additional information.