Bainbridge Island Museum of Art’s ‘Indigenous Craft’ Survey of Salish Sea Artists Closes November 1

‘Indigenous Craft’, a survey at the Bainbridge Island Museum of Art (BIMA) presented as part of its Handwork 2026 program, closes on November 1. Organized with co-curator Robin Little Wing Sigo (Suquamish/Duwamish), the exhibition gathers Native American and First Nations artists working in both traditional and contemporary forms across the museum’s MESA, Lovelace and Hall Orientation galleries.

More than 20 artists are represented, all of whom have lived and worked in the Salish Sea region, among them Larry (Ulaaq) Ahvakana, Peg Deam, Joe Feddersen, Denita and Joey Holmes, Barbara Lawrence, Betty Pasco, Preston Singletary and Jennifer Angaiak Wood. The media range from fiber and textiles to wood carving, ceramics, glass and jewelry, and the wearable pieces include ceremonial regalia as well as fashion.

Woven work features prominently. Lawrence (Suquamish) shows a 2025 hat made from the inner bark of red cedar with glass trade beads and dentalium shells. Pasco (Suquamish) contributes two 2024 pieces, ‘Traditional Weaving Materials I’ and ‘II’, built from cedar, raffia, cedar bark cordage, bear grass and sweet grass with its seed pods intact. Feddersen (Colville Confederated Tribes) is represented by ‘Phoenix’ (2023) and ‘Roll Call’ (2018), both in twined waxed linen and both from BIMA’s permanent collection.

Carving and sculpture form another strand. Wood (Yup’ik) presents ‘Destruction’ (2022) from the ‘Weapons of War Series’, combining charred basswood with pigments, feathers, willow and beach-weathered bone. Ahvakana (Inuit/Iñupiaq) is shown through a 1999 loon mask form in Port Orford yellow cedar with ivory and beads, and ‘Storyteller’ (2007), carved in raspberry alabaster. Other works include Johnny Maynard Jr.’s painted yellow-cedar ‘Great Colorful Heron’ (2018), Troy Roberts’s ‘Dogfish Paddle’ (2016) in western red cedar with copper and abalone, Ed Archie NoiseCat’s ‘Toonie Bear’ (2023) and Toma Villa’s ‘Renegade on the River’, made with cedar, acrylic and horsehair.

Glass is represented by Singletary (Tlingit), whose blown and sand-carved pieces ‘Earth Prayer’ (2025) and ‘Emerald City’ (2026) are on view.

Sigo directs the Suquamish Foundation and co-founded SaltFire, a nonprofit centered on Indigenous joy, rest and whimsy. She has previously advised the museum on Indigenous exhibitions and programs and sits on its Advisory Council. According to BIMA, the show is the fourth major Indigenous exhibition it has produced since opening in 2013. A recent installment of the museum’s Exhibition Insights video series features Sigo alongside Lawrence, Singletary, Villa and Wood.