LITERARY LANDMARK -- Shore to Shore statue, Brockton Point, east end of Stanley Park, Vancouver.
Before Edward Stamp built a sawmill at Brockton Point around 1865, the promontory north of Coal Harbour was utilized as a burial site for early white settlers. It was named for Francis Brockton, engineeer of Captain Henry Richards' HMS Plumper, after Brockton reputedly found a vein of coal at Coal Harbour in 1859. In 2015, it became home to one of the first pieces of Coast Salish art to be installed in Stanley Park, a 14-foot (4.2 metre) bronze-cast cedar sculpture, the subject of Suzanne Fournier's Shore to Shore: The Art of Ts'uts'umutl Luke Marston (Harbour). "Along with Susan Point's house portals and the Squamish Albert Yelton Pole,"; said Fournier in 2015, "Shore to Shore establishes the rightful place of the Coast Salish in Stanley Park, at a site which 9.5 million people visit each year, but one which has until recently displayed only northern-style totem poles.";
ENTRY:
In Shore to Shore: The Art of Ts'uts'umutl Luke Marston, Suzanne Fournier profiles First Nations artist, Luke Marston, who created the sculpture at Brockton Point, and describes his journey to Portugal to research the work. The title "Shore to Shore" references Marston's great-great-grandfather, Portuguese Joe Silvey, who sailed from the Azores Islands of Portugal to the West Coast of Canada in the mid-1800s.
Silvey and his mixed race family lived at Brockton Point, where the Coast Salish had lived for millennia. The carving equally commemorates Silvey's two First Nations wives, therefore paying tribute to the largely unwritten history of mixed-culture families in Coastal B.C.
Silvey's first wife, Khaltinaht, was a Musqueam and Squamish noblewoman who died tragically early of TB. Silvey's second wife, Kwatleematt (Lucy), was a Sechelt First Nation matriarch who was Marston's great-great-grandmother.
Lucy raised eleven children to adulthood and her second eldest child, Elizabeth, was the first registered birth of the child of white/aboriginal parents.
The sculpture rests on a 2.5-foothigh base of black-and-white Portuguese mosaic stone. It also includes images of seine nets, whaling harpoons and Pacific coast salmon.
According to Fournier, the three First Nations who claim the park as unceded Coast Salish territory [Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh] were consulted closely throughout the project. Fournier accompanied Marston to his ancestors' village on the Azores where Portuguese Joe Silvey was raised to be a whaler. A celebratory feast was held at the Musqueam Cultural Centre on the same day as the formal unveiling on April 25, 2015.
The (approximately) $1 million project had to be funded by the community. It received one federal Legacies grant, which had to be matched. The Portuguese-Canadian community raised more than $300,000, and finally, just months from the unveiling date, Vancouver city council, Parks Board and the three First Nations contributed some financial support.
The Shore to Shore statue has a literary heritage beyond Suzanne Fourier's book. Jean Barman uncovered the histories of Joe Silvey and the mixed-raced families of Stanley Park in two books, The Remarkable Adventures of Portuguese Joe Silvey (Harbour 2004) and Stanley Park's Secret: Forgotten Families of Whoi Whoi, Kanaka Ranch, and Brockton Point (Harbour, 2005).
Barman also highlighted mixed-race B.C. families with Hawaiian origins in Leaving Paradise: Indigenous Hawaiians in the Pacific Northwest, 1787-1898 (University of Hawaii Press, 2006) and Maria Mahoi of the Islands (New Star, 2004).
Hence this statue that celebrates the amalgamations of racial backgrounds symbolizes both the progressive devolution of "British"; Columbia and its evolution as a self-aware multi-racial construct.
"History is usually written by the winners,"; Jean Barman wrote in 2003. "Their lives comprise the archival collections, and historically these have been white men enjoying political and economic privilege. So long as we rely on the materials at hand, we keep telling the same old stories.";
--
Suzanne Fournier is a journalist who has been working and writing about First Nations topics for over forty years. She divides her time between Galiano Island and Vancouver.
Ernie Crey and Suzanne Fournier examined the devastating impact of large scale efforts to assimilate Indians (as they were called) into mainstream Canadian society in Stolen from our Embrace: The Abduction of First Nations Children and the Rebuilding of Aboriginal Communities (D&M 1997 $29.95) for which they received the Hubert Evans Non-Fiction Prize 1998.
Crey was the executive director of the fisheries program for the Sto:lo Nation and a former president of the United Native Nations. He had also worked as a social worker on behalf of aboriginal families. "As a child, I was forcibly removed from Sto:lo culture by social welfare authorities," he recalled. "Our family life was shattered after my eight siblings and I were split apart into separate foster homes. We were never again to reunite as a family. In so many ways, the history of my family is the history of aboriginal children in Canada."
Review of the author's work by BC Studies:
Stolen from Our Embrace: The Abduction of First Nations Children and the Restoration of Aboriginal Communities
BOOKS:
Fournier, Suzanne, & Ernie Crey. (1997). Stolen From Our Embrace: The Abduction of First Nations Children and the Restoration of Aboriginal Communities (Douglas and McIntyre, 1997)
Shore to Shore: The Work of Luke Tsu ts'u mult Marston (Harbour 2014) $26.95 978-1-55017-670-4
[BCBW 2015] "Galiano"
Before Edward Stamp built a sawmill at Brockton Point around 1865, the promontory north of Coal Harbour was utilized as a burial site for early white settlers. It was named for Francis Brockton, engineeer of Captain Henry Richards' HMS Plumper, after Brockton reputedly found a vein of coal at Coal Harbour in 1859. In 2015, it became home to one of the first pieces of Coast Salish art to be installed in Stanley Park, a 14-foot (4.2 metre) bronze-cast cedar sculpture, the subject of Suzanne Fournier's Shore to Shore: The Art of Ts'uts'umutl Luke Marston (Harbour). "Along with Susan Point's house portals and the Squamish Albert Yelton Pole,"; said Fournier in 2015, "Shore to Shore establishes the rightful place of the Coast Salish in Stanley Park, at a site which 9.5 million people visit each year, but one which has until recently displayed only northern-style totem poles.";
ENTRY:
In Shore to Shore: The Art of Ts'uts'umutl Luke Marston, Suzanne Fournier profiles First Nations artist, Luke Marston, who created the sculpture at Brockton Point, and describes his journey to Portugal to research the work. The title "Shore to Shore" references Marston's great-great-grandfather, Portuguese Joe Silvey, who sailed from the Azores Islands of Portugal to the West Coast of Canada in the mid-1800s.
Silvey and his mixed race family lived at Brockton Point, where the Coast Salish had lived for millennia. The carving equally commemorates Silvey's two First Nations wives, therefore paying tribute to the largely unwritten history of mixed-culture families in Coastal B.C.
Silvey's first wife, Khaltinaht, was a Musqueam and Squamish noblewoman who died tragically early of TB. Silvey's second wife, Kwatleematt (Lucy), was a Sechelt First Nation matriarch who was Marston's great-great-grandmother.
Lucy raised eleven children to adulthood and her second eldest child, Elizabeth, was the first registered birth of the child of white/aboriginal parents.
The sculpture rests on a 2.5-foothigh base of black-and-white Portuguese mosaic stone. It also includes images of seine nets, whaling harpoons and Pacific coast salmon.
According to Fournier, the three First Nations who claim the park as unceded Coast Salish territory [Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh] were consulted closely throughout the project. Fournier accompanied Marston to his ancestors' village on the Azores where Portuguese Joe Silvey was raised to be a whaler. A celebratory feast was held at the Musqueam Cultural Centre on the same day as the formal unveiling on April 25, 2015.
The (approximately) $1 million project had to be funded by the community. It received one federal Legacies grant, which had to be matched. The Portuguese-Canadian community raised more than $300,000, and finally, just months from the unveiling date, Vancouver city council, Parks Board and the three First Nations contributed some financial support.
The Shore to Shore statue has a literary heritage beyond Suzanne Fourier's book. Jean Barman uncovered the histories of Joe Silvey and the mixed-raced families of Stanley Park in two books, The Remarkable Adventures of Portuguese Joe Silvey (Harbour 2004) and Stanley Park's Secret: Forgotten Families of Whoi Whoi, Kanaka Ranch, and Brockton Point (Harbour, 2005).
Barman also highlighted mixed-race B.C. families with Hawaiian origins in Leaving Paradise: Indigenous Hawaiians in the Pacific Northwest, 1787-1898 (University of Hawaii Press, 2006) and Maria Mahoi of the Islands (New Star, 2004).
Hence this statue that celebrates the amalgamations of racial backgrounds symbolizes both the progressive devolution of "British"; Columbia and its evolution as a self-aware multi-racial construct.
"History is usually written by the winners,"; Jean Barman wrote in 2003. "Their lives comprise the archival collections, and historically these have been white men enjoying political and economic privilege. So long as we rely on the materials at hand, we keep telling the same old stories.";
--
Suzanne Fournier is a journalist who has been working and writing about First Nations topics for over forty years. She divides her time between Galiano Island and Vancouver.
Ernie Crey and Suzanne Fournier examined the devastating impact of large scale efforts to assimilate Indians (as they were called) into mainstream Canadian society in Stolen from our Embrace: The Abduction of First Nations Children and the Rebuilding of Aboriginal Communities (D&M 1997 $29.95) for which they received the Hubert Evans Non-Fiction Prize 1998.
Crey was the executive director of the fisheries program for the Sto:lo Nation and a former president of the United Native Nations. He had also worked as a social worker on behalf of aboriginal families. "As a child, I was forcibly removed from Sto:lo culture by social welfare authorities," he recalled. "Our family life was shattered after my eight siblings and I were split apart into separate foster homes. We were never again to reunite as a family. In so many ways, the history of my family is the history of aboriginal children in Canada."
Review of the author's work by BC Studies:
Stolen from Our Embrace: The Abduction of First Nations Children and the Restoration of Aboriginal Communities
BOOKS:
Fournier, Suzanne, & Ernie Crey. (1997). Stolen From Our Embrace: The Abduction of First Nations Children and the Restoration of Aboriginal Communities (Douglas and McIntyre, 1997)
Shore to Shore: The Work of Luke Tsu ts'u mult Marston (Harbour 2014) $26.95 978-1-55017-670-4
[BCBW 2015] "Galiano"
Articles: 2 Articles for this author
Shore to Shore
Press Release (2014)
In Shore to Shore: The Art of Ts'uts'umutl Luke Marston, journalist Suzanne Fournier tells the story of one of the first pieces of Coast Salish art to be installed in Stanley Park and the artist who created it. The sculpture-titled Shore to Shore-depicts three figures of huge importance in the history of coastal British Columbia: Portuguese Joe Silvey, one of the province's most colourful pioneers; Khaltinaht, a noblewoman from the Musqueam and Squamish First Nations and Silvey's first wife; and Kwatleematt (Lucy), a Sechelt First Nation matriarch and Silvey's second wife.
Fournier and Marston (who is the great-great-grandson of Portuguese Joe Silvey and Kwatleematt) will be joined by other members of the Silvey family in celebrating the launch of the book at the Bill Reid Gallery (639 Hornby St., Vancouver) on November 29 at 2pm. This free event is open to the public; food and refreshments will be made available, courtesy of the Consulate Of Portugal.
The Shore to Shore sculpture was conceived out of a need to honour Marston's First Nations and Portuguese ancestry and family history in Stanley Park. In it, Joe Silvey, Khatlinaht and Kwatleematt are surrounded by the tools of their trade: a seine net (Silvey was the first to take out a seine fishery license in BC); fishing net needles; a short throw net; and a whaling harpoon. Silvey is holding a spring salmon by the gills, representing the industry that allowed the family to thrive. The trio stands under a cod lure, which was used by First Nations. Each of the three fins of the lure is carved with the symbols and crests that represent the three figures.
In telling the story of this monumental sculpture and Marston's art, Suzanne Fournier combines interviews, research and creative non-fiction narration. She recounts Marston's career, from his early beginnings carving totems for the public at the Royal BC Museum, to his study under Haida artist Robert Davidson and jewellery master Valentin Yotkov, to his visits to both his ancestral homes: Reid Island and the Portuguese Azores island of Pico-journeys which provided inspiration for the Shore to Shore statue. Fournier also outlines the significance of the statue itself, and in doing so weaves together a rich and fascinating history.
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Book Launch Location: The Bill Reid Gallery of Northwest Coast Art (639 Hornby St., Vancouver)
Date and Time: Saturday, November 29 at 2:00pm
Food and refreshments will be made available, courtesy of the Consulate of Portugal.
From the Azores to Brockton Point
Article (2015)
One of the first pieces of Coast Salish art to be installed in Stanley Park is a 14-foot (4.2 metre) bronze-cast cedar sculpture, the subject of Suzanne Fournier's Shore to Shore: The Art of Ts'uts'umutl Luke Marston (Harbour $26.95).
"Along with Susan Point's house portals and the Squamish Albert Yelton Pole,"; says Fournier, "Shore to Shore establishes the rightful place of the Coast Salish in Stanley Park, at a site which 9.5 million people visit each year, but one which has until recently displayed only northern-style totem poles.";
In her new book, Suzanne Fournier profiles First Nations artist, Luke Marston, who created the sculpture, and describes his journey to Portugal to research the work.
The title of the Brockton Point sculpture, Shore to Shore, references Marston's great-great-grandfather, Portuguese Joe Silvey, who sailed from the Azores Islands of Portugal to the West Coast of Canada in the mid-1800s.
Silvey and his mixed race family lived at Brockton Point, where the Coast Salish had lived for millennia.
The carving equally commemorates Silvey's two First Nations wives, therefore paying tribute to the largely unwritten history of mixed-culture families in Coastal B.C.
Silvey's first wife, Khaltinaht, was a Musqueam and Squamish noblewoman who died tragically early of TB.
Silvey's second wife, Kwatleematt (Lucy), was a Sechelt First Nation matriarch who was Marston's great-great-grandmother.
Lucy raised eleven children to adulthood and her second eldest child, Elizabeth, was the first registered birth of the child of white/aboriginal parents.
The sculpture rests on a 2.5-foothigh base of black-and-white Portuguese mosaic stone. It also includes images of seine nets, whaling harpoons and Pacific coast salmon.
According to Fournier, the three First Nations who claim the park as unceded Coast Salish territory [Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh] were consulted closely throughout the project.
A celebratory feast at the Musqueam Cultural Centre followed the formal April unveiling.
The (approximately) $1 million project had to be funded by the community.
It received one federal Legacies grant, which had to be matched. The Portuguese-Canadian community raised more than $300,000, and finally, just months from the unveiling date, Vancouver City Council, Parks Board and the three First Nations contributed some financial support.
Five of Suzanne Fournier's forty years of writing about First Nations topics were spent recording the creation of Marston's Stanley Park monument.
For Shore to Shore, Fournier accompanied Marston to his ancestors' village on the Azores where Portuguese Joe Silvey was raised to be a whaler.
The Shore to Shore statue has a literary heritage beyond Suzanne Fournier's book. Jean Barman uncovered the histories of Joe Silvey and the mixed-race families of Stanley Park in two books, The Remarkable Adventures of Portuguese Joe Silvey (Harbour 2004) and Stanley Park's Secret: Forgotten Families of Whoi Whoi, Kanaka Ranch, and Brockton Point (Harbour, 2005). She has also highlighted mixed-race B.C. families with Hawaiian origins in Leaving Paradise: Indigenous Hawaiians in the Pacific Northwest, 1787-1898 (University of Hawaii Press, 2006) and Maria Mahoi of the Islands (New Star, 2004). Hence this unprecedented statue that celebrates the amalgamation of racial backgrounds symbolizes both the progressive devolution of "British"; Columbia and its evolution as a self-aware multi-racial construct.
"History is usually written by the winners,"; Jean Barman wrote in 2003. "Their lives comprise the archival collections, and historically these have been white men enjoying political and economic privilege. So long as we rely on the materials at hand, we keep telling the same old stories.";
978-1-55017-670-4
BCBW (Summer)