Robert Davidson (artist)

Robert Charles Davidson, CM, OBC (born 4 November 1946 in Hydaburg, Alaska), is a Canadian artist of Haida heritage. Davidson’s Haida name is: Guud San Glans which means Eagle of The Dawn. He is a leading figure in the renaissance of Haida art and culture.

Life and work

Detail of "Gyaana", totem pole designed by Davidson and carved by him and others, Lions Lookout Park, White Rock, British Columbia, Canada.

Davidson is known internationally as a carver of totem poles and masks, printmaker, painter and jeweller. He lives near Vancouver, working out of a studio on Semiahmoo First Nation land and making annual return visits to Haida Gwaii.

His parents are Claude and Vivian Davidson and, through Claude, he is the grandson of the Haida artist and memoirist Florence Davidson. He is a member of the Eagle moiety, Ts'ał'lanas lineage. His younger brother and former apprentice, Reg Davidson, is also a Haida carver.

In infancy, he moved to the Haida village of Masset, British Columbia, on Haida Gwaii (Queen Charlotte Islands). For high school, he moved to Vancouver to attend Point Grey Secondary School in 1965. In 1966 he became apprenticed to the master Haida carver Bill Reid. In 1967 he began studies at the Vancouver School of Art. In 1969 he raised the first totem pole on Haida Gwaii in approximately ninety years.

His works are included in the collections of the National Gallery of Canada, the Canadian Museum of Civilization and the Vancouver Art Gallery.^[1]

A significant solo exhibition of his work, Robert Davidson: The Abstract Edge was organized by the Museum of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia (UBC) for viewing at the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa in 2007.

Awards and recognition

• Honorary Doctor of Fine Arts, University of Victoria, 1992^[2]
• Honorary Doctor of Laws, Simon Fraser University, 1994^[3]
• Order of British Columbia, 1995^[4]
• National Aboriginal Achievement Award, now the Indspire Awards, 1995^[5]
• Member of the Order of Canada, 1996^[6]
• Honorary Doctor of Letters (D.Litt.), University of British Columbia, 2007^[7]
• Aboriginal Art Lifetime Achievement Awards, BC Achievement Foundation, 2007^[8]
• Governor General’s Awards in Visual and Media Arts, Canada Council, 2010^[1]
• Member, Royal Canadian Academy of Arts^[9]

If we look at the world in the form of a circle, let us look at what is on the inside of the circle as experience, culture and knowledge: Let us look at this as the past. What is outside of the circle is yet to be experienced. But in order to expand the circle we must know what is inside the circle.

— guud san glans, Robert Davidson^[10]

Notes

Sources

• Blackman, Margaret B. (1982; rev. ed., 1992) During My Time: Florence Edenshaw Davidson, a Haida Woman. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
• Jensen, Doreen, and Polly Sargent (1986) Robes of Power: Totem Poles on Cloth. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.
• Macnair, Peter L., Alan L. Hoover, and Kevin Neary (1984) The Legacy: Tradition and Innovation in Northwest Coast Indian Art. Vancouver, B.C.: Douglas & McIntyre.
• Stewart, Hilary (1993). Looking at Totem Poles. Seattle: University of Washington Press. ISBN 0-295-97259-9.
• Robert Davidson lands lifetime achievement award By Alex Browne, Arts Reporter, Peace Arch News, 12 June 2007
• Rhyne, Charles, Robert Davidson, and Susan Fillin-Yeh (1998) Expanding the Circle: The Art of Guud San Glans, Robert Davidson. Portland, Ore: Douglas F. Cooley Memorial Art Gallery, Reed College.

External links

• Robert Davidson official website
• Douglas Reynolds Gallery (Vancouver, Canada)
• Spirit Wrestler Gallery (Vancouver, Canada)
• Kinsman Robinson Galleries
• Order of British Columbia: Robert Davidson
• Robert Charles Davidson at The Canadian Encyclopedia