Ceremonial Copper (t´łakwa)
Kwakwaka’wakw artist, Ceremonial Copper (t´łakwa), Before 1900. Engraved copper; 30 3/8 × 11 ½ × ½ in. Denver Art Museum: Native Arts acquisition funds, 1970.507
Part of a collection of Kwakwaka’wakw art from Alert Bay, a small island located off the east coast of Vancouver Island, this copper was purchased from a Kwakwaka’wakw woman named Lucy Brown by James Economos, a tribal art dealer and personal collector for Morton D. May, heir to the May Company department stores. The copper was included in a sale of Northwest Coast art at the company’s Los Angeles location in 1967 and was purchased by Denver Art Museum in 1970 from a Los Angeles–based art dealer. A similar copper purchased by Economos is now in the collection of the Saint Louis Art Museum.