Bring this Yanyèdi Chilkat blanket home!

Hi, my name is Ben Louter, and I'm starting this fundraiser on behalf of the Taku River Tlingit community in Atlin, B.C. I'm a settler archaeologist who works for the Taku River Tlingit First Nation. A few days ago my friend Wayne Carlick reached out to me and told me that a Chilkat blanket, collected from one of the Tlingit communities on the Taku river in 1880, was going up for auction at an arthouse. Wayne is a Taku River Tlingit master carver as well as an elder, and he is a dedicated advocate for sharing the power of art and culture with his community. When he told me that this blanket would be going to auction, we agreed that we had to try everything possible to bring this incredible piece of art back to the community it was taken from years ago.

This Chilkat blanket is made of woven mountain goat hair spun over a core of cedar bark string. The wolf design on the blanket indicates that it belonged to someone from the Yanyèdi (wolf) clan. These hand-woven garments took over a year to weave. Chilkat blankets are a type of regalia that were often worn during dances and ceremonies.

Currently, hundreds of pieces of Tlingit art are kept in distant museums and private art collections. Most community members rarely have opportunities to engage with the art forms that their ancestors perfected, except as photos on the internet. Many of these pieces were collected by European fur traders and gold seekers after epidemic diseases had decimated Tlingit communities living on the Taku. Today, the Taku River Tlingit First Nation is actively working to repatriate artifacts and cultural pieces from museums and private collections. As a non-indigenous archaeologist who works with the Taku River Tlingit community, I am working with museums to transfer these pieces back to their original home.

100% of the funds raised in this fundraiser will go to paying the auction price tag for this incredible Chilkat blanket, as well as any related expenses such as shipping. The art dealers Wayne and I are in contact with estimate that the blanket will sell for $20,000.00 USD, as it is a very rare piece.

UPDATE: Peter Wright, an Atlin local, stepped forward and generously agreed to pay $47,500.00 to the auction house Waddingtons to purchase the robe on Taku River Tlingit's behalf. The First Nation will have to repay Peter. The funds raised in this campaign will help to offset the price paid by the rest of the TRTFN community. I'm also raising funds through grant writing, as there are several repatriation grants in BC. As the temporary manager of this fund, I will eventually send a wire transfer to Peter to repay the loan that he has provided to the Taku River Tlingit community.

Please give what you can, and please share this post!

Gunalchéech/ Thank you with respect