31 January 2009

Haida chief's tomb


Description by Edward S. Curtis: The remains of the chief rest in a niche cut into the top of the transverse beam. This tomb is of unusual form, and must have been erected at enormous cost to the dead man's family.
Found in the American Memory collection of the Library of Congress while looking for something else. I've never before seen a tomb even vaguely resembling the one depicted in this image. Will return to this subject later.

3 comments:

  1. I think there are groups in various places around the world who "bury" their dead in the air.

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  2. Edward Curtis took so many amazing photos. I live in the Pacific Northwest so I see them regularly, I have a print of 2 dancers crouching in masks. The clarity of his photos, when you consider the age, is just amazing. I heard he had thousands more negatives but when he and his wife were to be divorced he destroyed a lot of them so she couldn't profit from them. He took pictures of tribes all over.

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  3. I have an original photograuvere of Haida Chief's Tomb by Curtis. Sadly I am selling it. It has been over my bed for the last 10 years now. It is..truly stunning.

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