Arts

08 Jun 09

One of the Blackfoot shirts that will be used in the handling workshops and exhibitions for the project.

Five spectacular Blackfoot men’s shirts, based in Oxford’s Pitt Rivers Museum, are the focus of a new research project that brings together British and Canadian museums and universities with Blackfoot people in Canada and the United States.

Dr Laura Peers, Curator of the Americas Collections at the Pitt Rivers Museum and Reader in Material Anthropology at Oxford and Dr. Alison Brown from the University of Aberdeen have been awarded £183,401 from the Arts and Humanities Research Council for the project. They will work with Blackfoot elders, artists and youths from southern Alberta and northern Montana to explore these important historic garments.

The shirts were collected in 1841 by Sir George Simpson, the Governor of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and have been in the collection of the Pitt Rivers Museum since 1893. They were donated by the family of Edward Hopkins, who was secretary to Sir George. Some are decorated with porcupine quillwork, hair and painted designs.

The project will commence in August 2009 and run over two years. It will involve the public exhibition of the shirts in 2010 at two Canadian museums that are located in traditional Blackfoot territory: the Glenbow Museum in Calgary and the Galt Museum in Lethbridge, Alberta.

There will also be handling sessions for Blackfoot people to examine the shirts closely and learn about the manufacturing techniques and their spiritual meanings. 

In addition, the Pitt Rivers Museum will host a conference for project participants and museum professionals to discuss how to provide culturally appropriate care for Blackfoot materials in museum collections.

Project director, Dr Peers, said: ‘We are so pleased to be able to make the shirts available for Blackfoot people to study, as very few early garments such as these exist in Canada. The shirts were worn for ceremonies as well as in warfare, and the designs in the quillwork refer to sacred stories and knowledge.

‘We hope that being able to touch and explore the shirts close up will help to preserve cultural knowledge amongst Blackfoot communities. We also look forward to learning more about the shirts and their historic uses and meanings, and about how Blackfoot people think about them today.’

The project is a response to requests by Blackfoot elders that museums make the historic artifacts in their collections available to their communities. Dr Brown said: ‘We are especially looking forward to working with Blackfoot students in the community schools and colleges who rarely have the opportunity to engage with such important artifacts.’

The Blackfoot people live on three reserves in southern Alberta, Canada, theKainai Nation, the Piikani Nation and the Siksika Nation, and one reservation in northern Montana, USA.

Frank Weasel Head, from the Kainai Nation, said, ‘This project is about bringing our history back to our people, seeing these shirts will give our young people a sense of pride.’