Nationally-known portrait photographer Matika Wilbur, of the Swinomish and Tulalip tribes, just opened another extraordinary exhibit at her Tidelands gallery near the Seattle waterfront.
Wilbur and 14 other regional native artists offer a stunning show of art embodying the cultural creation stories, as told primarily by the 13 Coast Salish tribes who speak the Lushootseed language.
The stories are histories of how the land, the waters, the animals and the first peoples came to be, Wilbur said.
A 2002 graduate of La Conner High School and an alumna of the Brooks Institute of Photography, Wilbur is perhaps best known for her book “Project 562” and for co-hosting the podcast “All My Relations.”
Project 562 began in 2012 when Wilbur traveled across the country with the goal of photographing members of all U.S. tribes. Shortly after the culminating book was published in 2023, Wilbur and her family opened the gallery just off the busy Seattle waterfront tourist area. The first gallery exhibit focused on Wilbur’s project portraits.
The current exhibition opens with an introduction:
“Our people have lived here since the beginning of time. We understand ourselves as children of the land, taught how to live in balance, in health, and in relationship. Our wealth does not come from what we own, but from what we share.”
In the spirit of sharing, the exhibit opened Feb. 7 with song and readings, much of it spoken in Lushootseed, with reminders that the language and the creation stories nearly disappeared when children were taken to residential schools and the U.S. government enacted laws that prevented tribes from participating in traditional gatherings and activities.
If you visit the gallery, be sure to read all the posted creation stories, written for the exhibit by Amber Hayward of the Puyallup Tribe.
At the heart of the stories is the Changer or Transformer, who shaped the mountains, the rivers and the people, marking the beginning of the first people to inhabit Western Washington.
The art work includes carvings, paintings, a quilt, photos and a cedar rope.
Peter Boome of the Upper Skagit Tribe shows a large mural painting of Thunder Child, a spirit who came to live on Earth and rode in on a bolt of lightning.
Wilbur’s photo-painting is of Old Bull Frog Lady, who cares for one of the first babies, part of the story of the sisters who descended to the land on a braided cedar-bark rope.
Wilbur’s aunt Judy Gobin of Tulalip, a fiber artist, crafted a representation of the rope for the exhibit.
“Tidelands is a space where native people can tell our stories and celebrate our language,” Wilbur said. “Our art work is relevant in our society today. We need kinship structures with all brown people. For future generations, we need to fight back against systems of oppression.”
Gale Fiege is a retired newspaper journalist who lives near La Conner.
