Welcome to the Native Art Site of Shirley Babcock

"In the Spirit of our Ancestors"

Mid Coast Native Art Style

Most people are familiar with "Native Art" In British Columbia, there are 4 different coastal art styles. This site is intended to demonstrate the Mid Coast Art style.

• North Coast (Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian, Haisla, Nisga'a, Gitksan, Heiltsuk and Nuxalk people)
• Mid Coast (Kwakwakawakw, Oweekeno and Comox people)
• South Coast (Coast Salish groups)
• West Coast (Nuu-Chah-Nulth groups)

Although Shirley created her own style using variations of the following components, she uses the basic forms passed down through generations of her ancestors of the Mid Coast Art Style. Historically (before traders) paintbrushes were made from animal hair (often porcupine or squirrel). Paints were made from natural earth pigments.

• Black: wood charcoal, soot, lignite or graphite.
• Red: grinding ferric oxide, cinnabar.
• Green or Blue: mixing ground copper minerals, sulphide, copper oxides or blue mineralized clay.
• White: burnt clam shells ground to a powder.

They include primary (usually continuous and red) and secondary form lines (ovoids & u-shapes, red or black) Expanding the colors from the black, red & green used by the North Coast style to using white, grey, shades of blue, brown, turquoise and yellow. The red became a brown-red.

• Inner & Outer Ovoids: were used for head, body, joints, fin and tail bases, wings, nostrils, ears, feet, legs and arms.
• S-Forms: were used for fins, arms, legs and muscle masses.
• U-Forms: Larger U-forms are used to contour the body and as part of the form-line for tails or ears. Smaller U-forms are used as space fillers or feathers of a bird. Multiple U-forms can also be stacked together to represent tails or fins.
• Negative Areas: define the edge of form-line and design elements, also may contain rows of dashes, dots or straight lines.