Stone tools get reboot
Self-taught Deline artist shares his craft at heritage centre
Emelie Peacock
Northern News Services
Friday, July 28, 2017
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Outside the Prince of Wales Northern Heritage Centre this week, a group of visitors could be seen chipping away at black, white and multicoloured rocks with traditional tools.
Dominick Serviss, left, and mom Luzimar Serviss practise making stone tools at the Prince of Wales Northern Heritage Centre on July 26 during the Brazilian family's summer visit to Yellowknife. The stone-making event brought Deline artist and carver Gary Elemie to Yellowknife to teach the craft of stone-tool making to residents and visitors. - Emelie Peacock/NNSL photo |
They were learning the ancient craft of stone-tool making from Deline carver Gary Elemie.
Elemie has always been an artist, transitioning between painting, soapstone carving, jewelry making and his latest focus – stone tool making. After he heard about the craft from an elder, Elemie began to teach himself by experimenting with various types of rock.
Elemie shared his craft with a group of visitors and residents at the third and last Traditional Artist-in-Residence event run by the Prince of Wales Northern Heritage Centre.
As far as he knows, Elemie is the only person in his region making stone tools.
"This method has been lost for a long time," he said. "I'm trying to get that traditional flint knapping, try to get it back to our young kids."
Making these tools – flint knapping as it's officially known – can be fun and ensure survival on the land.
"In case you get stranded or stuck, you've got no gun or bullet or anything like that," said Elemie. "You can use this for a skill or a hobby. Or just to kill time."
Elemie explained the process of stone-tool carving, or flint knapping as it is officially known, is all about practice. Some rocks can be dangerous, cutting through protective gloves, so practise on less dangerous rocks first is essential.
Jean Sexmith, visitor services intern at the heritage centre and a stone-tool hobbyist, said he has heard of people using these tools in activities such as hide scraping.
"One elder explained that she didn't like metal scrapers because she found it took too much of the hide off, whereas the stone one worked better," said Sexsmith. "She was able to control the angle and sharpness of everything."
Sexsmith said the traditional activities taught at the artist-in-residence events give visitors and residents of the North an appreciation of the realities of life here before modern amenities.
"It gives people a better appreciation of the history for Indigenous people here in the North," he said. "An appreciation that this is what they had to do to get food on the table, to hunt that caribou."
Sexmith said the experience gives visitors a sense of the mental and physical work required in making these tools, something he hopes will shift common understandings of early human society.
"It's an opportunity for people to understand that just because they see a stone tool doesn't mean it's primitive," he said. "There's a lot of math involved, there's geometry involved, there's actual physics involved as well."
Last year the centre ran a moosehide tanning camp Sexsmith said was very well attended, attracting 1,000 people per week. Children came all the way from Hay River and Fort Smith to take part. This year the crowds are smaller with an average of 20 people per day, yet Sexsmith said changing the summer programming is necessary to keep the offerings fresh.
There were a total of three artist-in-residence demonstrations this summer. The first was Lutsel K'e's Alizette Lockhart, who demonstrated fish-scale art. Last week, a father-daughter duo Damian and Rae Panayi shared their knowledge of canoe re-canvassing.
