Museum officials "playing with fire"

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Mohawk false-face mask back on display

A sacred false-face mask used by the Mohawk Indians for religious ceremonies is again on display in the Glenbow Museum's Spirit Sings exhibition.

The decision was made to allow the museum to display the artefact by a Calgary court Jan. 28. In an earlier ruling the mask had been removed after the Mohawks applied for an injunction.

In its argument, the Glenbow said the mask had been displayed in various museums for many years without objection from the Mohawks who wanted it out of the exhibition.

However, Mohawk leaders say museum officials are playing with fire by ignoring their wishes because the mask "has its own powers of persuasion."

Attempts will continue

In a statement after the ruling Joe Norton, grand chief of the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake said it won't end their attempt to get back their artefacts.

"We're not going to go home in despair," he said, pointing out that the mask is a living spirit and shouldn't be publicly displayed. Norton and the Mohawk Elders believe the mask will exert its own influence in reacting to the court decision.

During the hearing the Glenbow said the Mohawks only wanted to remove the mask to disrupt the $3-million Spirit Sings exhibition. However, Norton says the Mohawk action was not just to embarrass officials but to bring about sensitivity to the issue of Native religion.

No photographs

In an interview from his Kahnawake office last week, chief Alvin Rice asked that no photographs of the mask be used as the battle with the museum will continue.

"We have consulted with our Elders and we believe we are taking the right action. We have to bring about more awareness within the non-Native community . . . we have to show that these articles are sacred."

Rice says the display of the mask violates the intended purpose of the mask and its sacred functions. It "constitutes a desecration, and ridicules and misrepresents the spiritual beliefs and practices of the Iroquois, including the Mohawk nation and its members," said Rice.

The mask has animal teeth and horse's hair and is used by members of a secret group, called the False Face Society, to heal illness. Only society members were allowed to see or keep it.

Great power

According to Mohawk evidence, the mask originally represented an evil spirit that took part in a competition with the Creator to see who had the power to move a mountain. The Creator won and the evil spirit's face was disfigured by competing.

It then became a spirit that would protect and give spiritual health to the Iroquois nation.

Court documents this week indicated that the mask had been owned by Evelyn Johnson, sister of famous Native poet Pauline Johnson, daughters of a Mohawk chief.

Evelyn Johnson was the last surviving member of the family whose ancestral home, called Chiefswood, is on the Six Nations reserve near Brantford.

According to documents, Johnson donated the mask to the Royal Ontario Museum in 1922. Johnson died in 1937 and was buried at the foot of her father's grave at the Mohawk churchyard.