At the age of nine Susan Point was sent to the Sechelt residential school and kept away from her family for five years before entering the work force. She worked in a cannery with her mother until moving to various secretarial positions. In 1981, at the age of 29, Point began to uncover her creative talent after enrolling in a six-week jewellery-making course at Vancouver Community College. Later Michael Kew, a UBC anthropologist, helped Point learn about the Coast Salish artistic heritage of her Musqueam people.

Edited by Gary Wyatt, Coast Salish Artist (D&M $39.95) collects Point's imagery along with essays by Kew on traditional Coast Salish art, Peter MacNair on the art of Susan Point, and Bill McLennan on three of Point's new monumental carvings.

The sacred and private character of an image revealed in dreams or visions-either threatening or beneficial-is an integral part of Coast Salish heritage. Frogs are important symbols for Point, as a memory of childhood when the Musqueam people would listen for the singing of frogs as a sign of coming spring. One of her pieces, 'Singing the Season,' shows five carved frogs with silver domes for eyes, above a face cast in brilliant green cotton paper and trimmed with cedar bark rope. With development and urbanization, the song of the frogs is harder to hear, and sometimes entirely silent. 0-295-98018-4

[BCBW SUMMER 2001]