tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1170694615298711572024-02-01T21:01:30.287-08:00Dawson City, December: Klondike OsteobiographiesArt in the subarctic, Klondike Institute of Art & Culture, Dawson City, YT, Canada. December 1-31, 2015.WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.comBlogger18125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-63546763447327888842016-04-11T16:07:00.001-07:002016-04-11T16:09:01.045-07:00RIP Evan Sabourin. I will remember all of the good things, and there were many good things about our time cohabiting together at Macaulay House.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMFtgKQc8ovPlN0q3NafeFSaTshgN03Qq2tcOVksxgbfqUYTrVudQws8ahN8p02UCh6FHwu_qNAM5A-tYIKSkJqDg2TWFbwN0_G-JyvC1okqYv0lcPT38XO4TukDCy9Ag2hjgJwqu4OpUH/s1600/12525279_1146176365443631_5317331095697255639_o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMFtgKQc8ovPlN0q3NafeFSaTshgN03Qq2tcOVksxgbfqUYTrVudQws8ahN8p02UCh6FHwu_qNAM5A-tYIKSkJqDg2TWFbwN0_G-JyvC1okqYv0lcPT38XO4TukDCy9Ag2hjgJwqu4OpUH/s640/12525279_1146176365443631_5317331095697255639_o.jpg" width="476" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo by Rémi </td></tr>
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<br />WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-62655139343353203462016-01-15T14:08:00.002-08:002016-01-15T14:46:50.884-08:00finale: trial by toe + abandonment anxietyIt's time to conclude this blog with a final post. There was so much that happened in the final days of my residency at KIAC, that I hardly know where to begin... but I will begin on my birthday, the day I left, New Year's Eve, Dec 31.<br />
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I took advantage of the event of my birthday in Dawson City, where you can go to every bar for a free drink. Since there were only two or three bars open in town in December and I didn't have much time left before my flight, I had to choose strategically. I decided to do <i>the toe</i>. It was only appropriate. I'm not going to pay $5 to put a dirty, rotten toe in my mouth, but for free, I will try it just once. <br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMC4MYsN9OGkWWlkecAkUlYBGvTE2qERg34wlHQoFMzSJNSQhEAITbUcdWE73bTB4NbKo1ENG943ZmB4FBZDff2UV0hnMtfuDq-yttirhts6LQ0CYKgUUVdcPF4lMlP67JmB9yk8Iq84B2/s1600/IMG_8270.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="428" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMC4MYsN9OGkWWlkecAkUlYBGvTE2qERg34wlHQoFMzSJNSQhEAITbUcdWE73bTB4NbKo1ENG943ZmB4FBZDff2UV0hnMtfuDq-yttirhts6LQ0CYKgUUVdcPF4lMlP67JmB9yk8Iq84B2/s640/IMG_8270.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Health regulators say the drink has to be at least 40% alcohol. I had mine in Jameson.</td></tr>
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And so I joined the ranks of The Sourtoe Cocktail club, started long ago by, you guessed it: a New Brunswicker. I didn't know that Capt. Dick was a New Brunswick 'river rat' until I read the ballad on the certificate that comes with the completion of the drink. So despite the fact that the sourtoe cocktail is <i>the </i>touristy thing to do in Dawson, I was proud to do it anyway. Besides, I earned my stripes: the toe stuck itself to the bottom of my glass and I had to tap the glass to get it to roll down to touch my lips (a prerequisite for truly achieving the feat), aaaaaand I ended up with the toe actually in my mouth, as it rolled quickly and with some force. <br />
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Before I rewarded myself with a blackened toe between my teeth, however, I borrowed Lulu's van and drove around Dawson abandoning my finished works. This was fun. The first work, a skull in a box, was installed in the infamous Pit, atop its piano. I figured this would be a place where it could be seen and appreciated by most of Dawson, and it seemed to fit the rest of the décor quite nicely. This piece, entitled "Cannibals" is connected to the Tr'ondëk Hwëch'in story of Moosehide Slide, as retold in an audio clip on the project website. I'll be uploading pics of the four abandoned objects to the project website in short order. Visit the Pit to see the skull in person.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgToyeEUOEmZl1hyyDzv6D6oc0iugJbSXAZhX4_WmhFnCMpRWH1tFcrhhe53NRJ63mnmfg7WQbda0QqxR7tJF8AvZTrTwigRPDtBrIJJOHEwRvUHHIbPnuYZEqYCIfIOS_eXLZQY9Qz3Ulg/s1600/IMG_8268.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="416" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgToyeEUOEmZl1hyyDzv6D6oc0iugJbSXAZhX4_WmhFnCMpRWH1tFcrhhe53NRJ63mnmfg7WQbda0QqxR7tJF8AvZTrTwigRPDtBrIJJOHEwRvUHHIbPnuYZEqYCIfIOS_eXLZQY9Qz3Ulg/s640/IMG_8268.jpg" title="© WhiteFeather Hunter" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The resting place for cannibal remains, Westminster Hotel, which contains The Pit.</td></tr>
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Another object was abandoned in a cave, a cave where many visitors have gone and many more will venture. I left the object with a famous storyteller who has agreed to be my collaborator in this project, and will personally pass on the info about how to find the story of the object, as well as details of the object itself.<br />
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A third object was abandoned somewhere people sometimes go by invite to have a guaranteed good time in Dawson, again guarded by a storyteller who has also agreed to protect and pass on information about the object.<br />
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A fourth object was abandoned in a dark place, a public and enclosed space but a space where it may not be found until sometime in the Spring or Summer. That is my hope. I'm sure it will be a shock when it is discovered.<br />
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I was satisfied with every final location I chose, knowing the works would be shared and/or protected until found. In the end, I didn't leave them to just deteriorate into the landscape because they were too beautiful and I knew that some animal would likely eat them before any person found them. Also, I needed a vessel to put the project website address onto. So, while they were still abandoned and not meant for a gallery, I did give them a more museological display, going against one of the ideals I typically strive for with my work: ephemerality. But, in the end, I'm OK with that!<br />
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<a href="http://yukonbones.wordpress.com/">Here is the project website</a>, which is still in progress for now, but which contains all of the stories as audio clips for your listening pleasure.<br />
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The day I left Dawson was my lucky day - I didn't have to pay for my luggage on the flight out, which is a miracle! Happy Birthday to me. That night, after an awesome birthday dinner in Whitehorse with one of my longest-standing best friends, I went out at midnight to greet the new year and look up into the sky. Just then, a single ribbon of aurora borealis streaked in an arc directly over my head, the only aurora visible in the sky. It rippled for about five minutes and was gone. Thus, I started my new year with a cosmic blessing, which has so far proven to be one of abundance and goodness. I adore the Yukon.<br />
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<i>Thanks to all of the special people I had the opportunity to connect with in Dawson City! I guarantee you, I WILL be back. </i>WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-30505918049607659672015-12-29T00:35:00.000-08:002015-12-29T00:58:03.733-08:00from inside the skull of the sun<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Last night I corkscrewed the cooked brains out from the inside of two marten skulls. It was truly disgusting -- I don't think I could ever eat brains, following this grotesque activity, so there goes my career as a zombie. Caveman Bill had shown up at my door with two skinned, frozen marten carcasses that he <a href="http://www.env.gov.yk.ca/hunting-fishing-trapping/abouttrapping.php">collected for me from a trapper</a> back a couple of days ago, and I finally got around to doing something with them after letting them hang out in the freezer on top of the ice cube trays and perogies awhile. I'm sure the smell of cooking marten drove out the weak-stomached from the house. Perhaps there is a better way to quickly clean bones but I'm a self-taught butcher. I regret that I didn't get to meet the woman who was originally supposed to be my co-resident. She is both an accomplished artist and the daughter of a big game hunter, so would have been an excellent match I'm sure, and someone who I might have learned from with regards to cleaning carcass. <br />
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Anyway, I got to experience first-hand what Caveman Bill had told me about bad animal juju. Marten meat is inherently foul, a very dark red flesh that cooks to a deep brown-purple and stinks of dark turkey meat combined with old fish (likely due to the marten diet). It's certainly not the most foul thing I've ever cooked, but it was a fairly pervasive stench. If I'd had time, I would have buried the bodies and let insects do the work of cleaning the bones, but I'm here for only another three days.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiemyfzQ2qQ1EaKzSg3BRMEaXC61_UKdUp8bz3xikxsGIavYL4uImzWXHBBA2Y-KR0dUV49L_iRIEdD0_wjid5JftY4Dg62e3p1_fRQ8RJviIa88XiE7ROQNktANfsMp_xwYsMbmyf9mmoh/s1600/IMG_8113.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="186" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiemyfzQ2qQ1EaKzSg3BRMEaXC61_UKdUp8bz3xikxsGIavYL4uImzWXHBBA2Y-KR0dUV49L_iRIEdD0_wjid5JftY4Dg62e3p1_fRQ8RJviIa88XiE7ROQNktANfsMp_xwYsMbmyf9mmoh/s640/IMG_8113.jpg" title="© WhiteFeather Hunter" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Midnight Dome sun and sundog.</td></tr>
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In brighter news, I did an epic hike to the Midnight Dome yesterday, during what was probably the most gorgeous day I've seen since arriving in Dawson. The light here is always special and stunning even when slight, but yesterday it was fairly mind-blowingly beautiful. The Dome is the highest point in these parts, where everything is visible all the way around for miles. Sweat was pouring down my spine while I hiked straight up for close to 2 hours in -25˚ weather - no hat or mitts required. My Canadian sherpas for this hike were Blair and Carly, and a sweet Scottish fella named Jim. The low light was so richly golden orange that all shadows in the snow appeared deep blue in contrast. On the way down, we slid on our bums in our snowpants, all the way down the steep power line cut, whipping out of control in a well-worn bobsled-like path. It was possibly the longest and most fun sliding of life.<br />
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Here are some more highlights from the climb up:<br />
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Work-wise, my project labour for this residency is nearing completion and I'm SO completely thrilled with the results. I love the objects. I will document them well before abandoning them, but part of me would like to keep them all. The stories will always be mine and will always be shared. One of the artifacts will be left at an indoor site, though I won't say where. All of the abandonment sites won't be easy places to get to. Carlos Jabbour has built me four beautiful wooden boxes now to house the objects (I only finished four of the original six planned). They all have clear plexi fronts screwed on, so that the contents are visible. Everything is a bit roughly constructed, but gorgeous and in keeping with Dawson's general ramshackle, makeshift vibe. The storytelling website with the audio clips (osteobiographies) is underway as well. I've learned more about what works well with this bone making process so I'm looking forward to repeating it again somewhere else! WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-59917674406860433382015-12-27T00:30:00.000-08:002015-12-27T00:44:59.081-08:00riverwalkers, a contemporary caveman + caribou balls<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Riverwalker on the Yukon.</td></tr>
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This post is dedicated to Caveman Bill, who is one of my favourite people in Dawson. He's kind, generous and intelligent, as well as being a keeper of a lot of interesting history of Dawson, from over the past couple of decades that he's been here. <br />
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Christmas Eve day, my partner and I forged a new path across the Yukon River, directly across from frozen bank to bank in the direction of Bill's cave. I had a steaming hot loaf of Macaulay House Bread, straight out of the oven and wrapped in a tea towel, to give to him. <br />
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Big, beautiful blue ice chunks litter the river. We follow animal tracks across. After a couple of -29˚ days, we are sure the river is frozen solid. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The entrance to Bill's cave - he climbs up the front of it to find me Spook's skull, which he still has.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Inside Caveman Bill's cave, looking towards the front entrance (that he built).</td></tr>
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Inside, we enjoy a cup of green tea that just sits on the wood stove and
never gets cold, even though it takes an hour to drink it all.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwTPb9iJdDkpLhQnt-zL5yCJnjRpfXVA9S1yRF0sPD5AXDNtnmIse6zFNygDHOHsOrOOTX4d0dZCRszR0Qp-lnC25uhHZzD2XMPVN9Lce_8T23D-4oXwpAMHITcPLugkjoG_ZTEhZJ3YHO/s1600/IMG_7935.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="138" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwTPb9iJdDkpLhQnt-zL5yCJnjRpfXVA9S1yRF0sPD5AXDNtnmIse6zFNygDHOHsOrOOTX4d0dZCRszR0Qp-lnC25uhHZzD2XMPVN9Lce_8T23D-4oXwpAMHITcPLugkjoG_ZTEhZJ3YHO/s640/IMG_7935.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">There's Bill sitting on his bed at the rear of the cave, the deepest part. (Click any image to enlarge it)</td></tr>
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Caveman Bill is a prolific woodworker, and the inside of his cave is full of beautifully crafted dovetail jointed boxes, cabinets, cupboards and desks that he's built and embellished with sweet designs carved into the front or top. The day we visited, he was just finishing a lap desk that he was about to give away to the person whose name he'd drawn in the Secret Santa draw. I was astounded that he'd give such an exquisite handmade gift - it was a writing-style desk top, with a hinged lid and underneath compartment, plus a side drawer that pulled out. His reply to my astonishment over the gift was that he donates all kinds of these hand-carved trunks, chests, boxes, etc to local fundraisers. I'm not sure he realizes the value of his work, or if he does, it doesn't compare to the value of the joy he gets from doing it. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">He shows us some of his unfinished works in progress, kept outside under a sheet of plywood.</td></tr>
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Speaking of woodworking, my partner and I built two boxes today of scrap wood we found in one of the Macaulay House sheds, for to house my 'bones' when they are abandoned outside. I aged them after they were built, with a wash of black acrylic, to look like so much of the old wooden structures in Dawson City. When they were finished, I loved them so much that I wanted to take them home to Montreal instead of abandoning them, but they were easy to make AND taking anything out of Dawson by plane is extremely pricey, as you pay per kilo. An abandonment project is a very good idea for KIAC residency. The boxes will have clear plexi fronts, so that the bones inside (and the web address leading to the audio clips of osteobiographical tales) can be seen without having to be tampered with.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix-A0lUy4LfBTXd90SZNFPSdxA90ebYzH3QBWdheIAyT_CbXBLTGNzE77tTi_SIUiG4j272NG_acvsGL9nzYzOQR8L2oHCwxlRpuNqWlnHt92TQW6sTZ6EOiEQkzoTiF8OuwdPVZCBEd7Q/s1600/IMG_8039.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix-A0lUy4LfBTXd90SZNFPSdxA90ebYzH3QBWdheIAyT_CbXBLTGNzE77tTi_SIUiG4j272NG_acvsGL9nzYzOQR8L2oHCwxlRpuNqWlnHt92TQW6sTZ6EOiEQkzoTiF8OuwdPVZCBEd7Q/s400/IMG_8039.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Working in my studio.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Crystals are growing now on my hog gut matrices to produce the bones for my project.</td></tr>
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I have feasted at different feasts continuously over the past three days, and I have to say that my favourite foods of all were Dan's amazingly delicious caribou meat balls, and Lulu's amazingly delicious moose meat stew. It was my first time eating caribou, that magical beast with the whirligig legs. I fared extremely well with local food, particularly considering that I could have been stuck with this Yukon standard for xmas dinner:<br />
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<br />WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-90304758319034993242015-12-23T18:16:00.002-08:002015-12-23T18:22:03.263-08:00Captain Dick's Spook, the conscientious raven + other solstice stories<iframe frameborder="no" height="166" scrolling="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/238889333&color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false" width="100%"></iframe> Play and read below.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The solstice fire I attended this year was in Sunnydale. The fire was fueled by burning a barn that had been picked up by a tornado and flattened in the past year, and it got so hot it burned up some of the fur on my hood.</td></tr>
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Dawson has more New Brunswickers than I can shake a stick at. I'm the entire way across the country, within a day's drive of the arctic circle and, lo and behold! As I join a solstice fire way the hell out in <a href="http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/in-photos-off-the-grid-and-on-top-of-the-world-in-the-yukon/article22273214/">Sunnydale (a remote, off the grid community which I'm not even sure is on the map)</a>, I'm informed by the first guy I meet that he's from Fredericton, knows me, knows my kid and my kid's father and dated so-and-so that I know. Throughout the night, I continue to meet more New Brunswickers who have all ditched the east coast for the wilderness of the far-flung Yukon outback. I'm pretty sure there were about five or six of us at this little gathering, and they don't account for the entirety of the New Brunswick contingent that I've met here. So, my solstice? Finding home away from home in a cold, remote place. Warms the insides better than whiskey. I'm slowly being sucked in to this vortex, but that's apparently what Dawson does.<br />
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Caveman Bill told me another story as we chatted around the solstice fire. This one's about Spook, one of Captain Dick's old horses, that Caveman Bill had to retrieve out of the snow and ice. <a href="http://yukon-news.com/letters-opinions/captain-dick-stevenson-the-inventor-of-the-sourtoe-cocktail">Captain Dick is of sourtoe cocktail fame</a>, but apparently back in the day, he had three horses: Spook, Coco and Black (three shades of black?). Well, back then, says Bill, there had been no such thing as the Humane Society (or SPCA) and there were always a pack of half-wild dogs running loose around Dawson. One night, during a deep freeze of about -50˚, Spook got loose. The wild dog pack sniffed this out and started chasing and nipping and pestering Spook, and ran him until he sweat so hard and so much in that -50˚ weather that he froze himself to death, steaming ice vapour off his body, and dropped over solid, on the spot. Well, Caveman Bill was "hired" by Captain Dick and his wife to go take a chainsaw and get Spook out of the ice. So, Bill tells me he sawed that horse up like a loaf of bread, separating him into pieces that he sold off to local folks to feed their dogs with, and even ate some himself (that was his payment for the job). I told him that horse meat is a specialty item in grocery stores in Quebec, so that was high livin'. Anyway, <a href="http://www.yukon-news.com/news/dead-horse-gulch">Dawson has an unfortunate history from its early gold prospector days of horses dropping dead</a> around here. I'm not 100% sure I'll use this story of Bill's for my project or not, but I just might. What's great about it, other than the fact that it's tied to the local geography, is that it's a story I don't think a lot of people know, which is true of most of the stories I've collected for this project. Bill is an excellent storyteller, too.<br />
I also used my time at the solstice fire as a chance to record the sound of a roaring blaze, which I think I might tie in to the story about the Saint of Dawson, Father Judge, who built the first church here and then watched it burn down not much later.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Me and a zoom recorder laying on the river ice.</td></tr>
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Earlier in the day, I went down to the still-open part of the Klondike River and recorded some river ambience for my latest story, the one about the shoulder blades and Otter Woman, one of the Tr'ondëk Hwëch'in myths. That audio piece is now done, so I've completed three osteobiographies. I have three bone matrices done, including Little Charlotte's hand, a shoulder blade and a dog leg. I'm working on a skull now to go with the story of Moosehide Slide, another Tr'ondëk Hwëch'in myth. The story of Moosehide Slide is a story that everyone knows around here, and was my first bone story when entering Dawson, told to me by Dan. However, I've collected other tidbits to go along with that story, told to me by Jody at the Tr'ondëk Hwëch'in Heritage Centre, and by Caveman Bill. So, I'm going to narrate a fuller compilation of their three stories. I need the Father Judge story to get more interesting for me--I need an additional bit of info from somewhere, beyond what is already out there on public record. I'm sure it will come. <br />
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To finish for today, let me tell you about an interaction I had this afternoon with a conscientious raven. Out in front of Bonanza Market, close to the corner of 2nd and Princess Streets, there is a certain twisted, naked tree that always has a scattering of ravens in its branches, watching down. I'd been noticing the ravens all day, feeling they were cooking up a plot of some kind and I wanted in on it. So, I pulled a piece of fresh cranberry muffin out of my bag. One of the ravens saw this and gave a chortle-kind of signal to the other ravens and a half dozen or so flew down to the road in front of me. I squatted with my hand out, muffin bits offered. None were brave enough to get that close, except for one big fluffy one, his neck feathers all ruffled out like a black tux. He'd hop over, then back off a few hops. He kept doing this, and finally I said, "It's ok, I'm your friend." I thought he was scared but alas, he was infinitely wiser than me. Knowing himself better than I, he hopped over again, looked me in the eye, then tap-tap-tapped his sharp spike of a beak down on the icy road in front of me, hammering at the ice, and then looked up at me again to see if I got the message. He was telling me very plainly that his razor beak was way too sharp to grab something out of my soft hand, and that I should just throw it down for him. I immediately understood, and tossed it to him. I thought it an extremely kind gesture on his part. Walking back to Macaulay House afterwards, my partner said to me, "You realize that the raven was telling you his beak was too sharp..."<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My manfriend arrived yesterday, just in time for Yukon Christmas madness. We are hoar-frosted.</td></tr>
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Tomorrow I'll tell you about the carcasses Caveman Bill arrived at my door with today.WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-3541833080501541432015-12-19T20:24:00.001-08:002015-12-19T20:24:26.711-08:00tombstone, whiskey + wilderness tips<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAg2YBl4nrhf-a94IoF8U5l1I0XN3pCWT6tGNuYygFCe3wwHbsGF_Moj4sZPtoBkVGzpz8WKAPLIT2xUXRjW24KLSGNnqVTBLSD7tfCl9pUer545wKQot8qt75V95nubzEmUw9gzrJitWi/s1600/IMG_7560.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="140" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAg2YBl4nrhf-a94IoF8U5l1I0XN3pCWT6tGNuYygFCe3wwHbsGF_Moj4sZPtoBkVGzpz8WKAPLIT2xUXRjW24KLSGNnqVTBLSD7tfCl9pUer545wKQot8qt75V95nubzEmUw9gzrJitWi/s640/IMG_7560.jpg" title="© WhiteFeather Hunter" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Tombstone Territorial Park. That's Evan to the right, in the way of my shot.</td></tr>
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I now have three stories recorded as audio files for my project. One is perfect, one is half-finished and one needs a bit of a tweak (my ravens are still too loud in the background). They are coming along really well and I'm pleased. I love this part of the project, because the stories are arriving fluidly at my ear through the local populace, and retelling them is extremely fun. I was given a bone story last night by a British sailor (you know what they say about how there's one in every port...) but his bone story wasn't directly tied to the Dawson landscape and so I can't really use it. I'll tell you his story here, anyway though because it's a good one:<br />
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He told me, over some shared whiskey drunk from Lulu's Norwegian skol cup, that back when he was at sea, there was a surgeon on board. Apparently this surgeon was perversely obsessed with performing surgery and proposed to this certain sailor that he allow his leg to be amputated. The surgeon promised to craft a stylish wooden leg in return, just like a sailor should have anyway. He had his trusty handheld bone saw on board, and just needed to be given a chance at slicing and stitching someone up. Thankfully, I'll tell you, this sailor still (I think) had both legs when I saw him. Cheers to that. And cheers to that again. And again. The trick for me around here is to double fist a fat glass of water with that glass or five of whiskey. <br />
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This town is one of great stories shared generously. I also learned some interesting wilderness tips from Caveman Bill last night, such as that bear should not be eaten at a certain time of year, in the spring, when they are catching all the salmon because the bear meat will taste fishy. Someone else told me that humans should never eat other meat-eaters, just grass eaters. Bill said the same for certain ducks: there are grass-eating ducks and fish-eating ducks, and you don't want the fish-eating ducks because they taste like rotten fish. You know the grass-eating ducks from the fish-eating ducks because of how low or high they sit in the water. One is more buoyant than the other, probably the fish-eating ducks because I think the grass eating ducks have to dive down. Or it's the other way around. He also said that no humans or animals will eat wolverine, because wolverines have bad wolverine juju (magic energies) and taste like shit. <a href="http://www.redsnapperfilms.ca/">Lulu</a> (an awesome filmmaker) throws a good party and thankfully there are no pictures, moving or otherwise, to prove it.<br />
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What I do want to share, however, is more pics of Tombstone Territorial Park, where I spent the whole of yesterday, in absolute awe. I gawked so much that my shoulders were sore at the end of the trip and at one point I seriously didn't know where to be looking because it was too much beauty for 360˚. The park was a vortex of blinding sunshine, blue sky and quickly changing colour everywhere: blended pastels on a stark black and white mountainous landscape. Mountains in this low-lying sunlight tend to glow ethereally in the distance. It was an entrance into another dimension, an oasis of gorgeousness and light in a dark world. The entire Dawson area and Dempster highway up to the park was a snow storm, yet somehow magically as we entered the unique mountainous ecosystem of the park, everything cleared away and another planet lay before us, beside us, behind us. Again as we left the park, the snowstorm world resumed as if we had been gone six seconds, not six hours. But back to while we were inside the vortex.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyL0rItXeW5XLdp7rhFhDFlYHelzS7FCBqY100zDDzHMqSAgLpiaxmx0Wj23Ip3OjuA9MHvQmBE9YkCBJMWSZJdCzndu9wXFKNw9QM66aofXGSm_Wb78W2kN-BIDSyf8x30uFNjgCz_bVM/s1600/IMG_7508.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="164" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyL0rItXeW5XLdp7rhFhDFlYHelzS7FCBqY100zDDzHMqSAgLpiaxmx0Wj23Ip3OjuA9MHvQmBE9YkCBJMWSZJdCzndu9wXFKNw9QM66aofXGSm_Wb78W2kN-BIDSyf8x30uFNjgCz_bVM/s640/IMG_7508.jpg" title="© WhiteFeather Hunter" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">That pink thing in the far distance, right, is a mountain peak.</td></tr>
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I saw caribou - about a dozen or so stragglers from the recent massive migration through the park. They were at quite a distance but I could still see them walking along in groups of three, and I was both delighted by this and convinced that I now understand WHY they are considered such magical creatures: their funny legs seemed to glide over the ground where they walked, in an almost cartoonish way, as if they were floating whirligigs of caribou. Dan said it's because the ground is very spongy and sinky, and that's how they walk on it. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><3 Tombstone Territorial Park, Yukon. Special thanks to Dan and Laurie Sokolowski for the amazing road trip through.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A likely story I found in a small shelter the park.</td></tr>
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WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-16659919036412024972015-12-15T00:21:00.000-08:002015-12-15T00:23:47.829-08:00rattling off stories of the land<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sunset/ beginning of evening twilight today, which eventually became a perfect vertical beam of gold light, shooting straight up into the sky.</td></tr>
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I had the privilege of meeting with a wonderful woman today at the <a href="http://trondek.ca/heritage.php">Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in Heritage Department</a>, who helped me immensely in my work to locate bone stories connected to the local landscape. Jody Beaumont works as a <i>Traditional Knowledge Specialist</i> for the department, is passionate about traditional myth and storytelling, and was extremely generous in sharing materials from their archives: transcribed interviews, books that record various versions of the Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in myths, and even her own notes from presentations that she's given on First Nations myth and storytelling. I spent a couple of hours sitting in her office poring over the books and print-outs she piled on the table for me, and digging deep into what they contained. I learned some amazing things, magical things, and things that make such plain and simple sense, including time/space travel medicine using caribou leg sinew. The best story, however, was the one Jody told me herself, in her own words, about a place we could see right out the windows, over the Yukon River. She told me the story of how once there were shoulder bones strung on a line across the river that rattled a warning whenever anyone came down in a canoe. I've read a variety of versions now, tonight, of the same or similar, partial stories from the many photocopied documents and the book she lent me, but her version was the best one. Maybe, because it was delivered to me by being spoken aloud and likely because her version contains the most bones. <br />
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One of the most important things that I've come away with from today, is that for the part of my project where I reveal the osteobiographies that are connected with each 'bone' I create and abandon in the landscape, I must share the stories orally. I don't think that written text is appropriate in this case. Almost every bone story I've collected since coming to Dawson has been given to me through speech, not text. A metamorphosis happens to story when it is delivered in such a way: it takes a piece of the storyteller with it, on to its next listener. It has more meaning, is more alive and personal. It creates social adhesion, which is the essential economy/currency of a transient (or nomadic, or non-materialistic) society. Text is a fixed medium for the most part, and I believe that myth and legend should not be fixed.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">One page of the first creation myth I ever wrote, in 1979.</td></tr>
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Stories <i>are</i> better when someone embodies them. My son has told me that some of his most cherished childhood memories are of listening to the stories I read aloud to him, loving them much more than any story he read himself. When I was an elementary school kid (in Alberta), I was given the extracurricular task of reading stories aloud to kids in the younger grades. One of the first skills I gained through that early storytelling practice was how to keep the various characters' voices distinct from one another, and distinct from my own voice. One of the first written storytelling skills I learned in that same school, that impacted me most, was how to write a traditional creation myth, during a workshop with a visiting indigenous artist. She came back later and taught me how to create beaded stories by sewing seed beads to felted shapes.<br />
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In the tissue engineering world, when a (cell) culture is 'fixed', it is dead (killed) and preserved in harsh chemicals. These stories are not meant to be that. So, I will retell my collected bone stories in spoken voice, recorded as audio files and available on the final project website. I've been playing with audio editing since I arrived, recording local sounds/music, so it seems a natural progression for this work. Perhaps some of the audio tracks I've recorded so far during my time here will become the backdrop for the spoken narratives.<br />
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Never has research for a project been such fun (and refreshing after so much academic research) -- I've been reading stories all afternoon and evening, laughing to myself with the cleverness and audacity of some of them, and making notes. I've read multiple tellings of the same myths, by different elders in different settlements along the Yukon River -- each one is an adaptation. The story that I construct from these traditional narratives, my own adaptation, will be true to the traditional stories, and acknowledge the story as deriving from the Gwich'in and Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in (Yukon) first peoples. I don't intend to appropriate traditional knowledge, but to work with one bone story in particular, the one Jody told me herself (and which I have only given the very bare bones of to you here), and respect that this is the language of the land, and therefore the old way of mapping the land. The traditional stories are the way that the land is known on a subconscious level to the people who inhabit it. This land-based knowledge is critical to the psychogeography of this place now called Dawson City.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A page from a transcribed interview conducted by Jody Beaumont. She gave me this copy today, and this is another version of the same story she told me.</td></tr>
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<br />WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-27487038467265272432015-12-13T21:50:00.000-08:002015-12-13T23:52:30.645-08:00bad dogs in west dawson<iframe frameborder="no" height="166" scrolling="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/237452382&color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false" width="100%"></iframe><br>
Hit play, turn up and read below.<br>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqr-u0nkBxSgjyQZAvozj9CyOcc6vqhOe2Hb0Y2epEkgsgXvx1k8gw_e2oUqVoTlWSzUkGxombXdnZBkJvBvnZRziCTNk_KRGAOAmp2gxTzQEeHtgIssk3AW_F4ig2FOsv4UeSy85cprya/s1600/IMG_7379.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqr-u0nkBxSgjyQZAvozj9CyOcc6vqhOe2Hb0Y2epEkgsgXvx1k8gw_e2oUqVoTlWSzUkGxombXdnZBkJvBvnZRziCTNk_KRGAOAmp2gxTzQEeHtgIssk3AW_F4ig2FOsv4UeSy85cprya/s320/IMG_7379.jpg" width="240"></a>I collected another bone story today while tucked away in a cabin in the woods with friends, along the edge of the Yukon River, in West Dawson. The above recording was made with my phone while we were gathered, around banana pancakes, bacon, eggnog gelato, eggs and avocado. Also, chaga. One unexpected guest to the brunch party was Caveman Bill. Caveman Bill has lived in a cave across the river from Dawson City proper (as opposed to West Dawson) for quite some time. West Dawson is a remote community across the Yukon River from Dawson City, mostly wooded, and annually cut off from the rest of civilization in the spring and early winter. Those times are when the river is either in the process of freeze up or break up, and is therefore not passable by foot or by ferry. Evan and I hiked for about 45 minutes across the frozen river and through the woods to get to the cabin. We passed a massive shipwrecked steam paddler along the way and I climbed up to peek into the rusted furnace room, which reminded me of a place where children might be baked for breakfast. <br>
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The new bone story came from Caveman Bill. He told me about a time, once upon a winter, when he was skiing along from his cave to somewhere else. He crossed an area in the snow that was a solid ice sheet, and couldn't figure out why it might be there as there was no water nearby. He skiied across the ice sheet and went to where he was going, but on the way back, decided to investigate to see if he could find the cause of it. He poked around at the sides of it and that's when he discovered a bone of his neighbour's dog. It was one of the leg bones with just a bit of recognizable fur on it, and part of a foot. That was all that was left of the poor dog. That's when he realized that the ice sheet was actually the kill site, and that the wolves who had killed the dog had licked up every last drop of blood from the snow. The ice sheet was the collective hot saliva of a ravaging wolf pack. He skied back then to his cave. He is not afraid of the wolves around in West Dawson, though. I will go visit him in his cave sometime while I am still here in Dawson.<br>
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This week, on Wednesday, will be mine and Evan's artist talk at the KIAC Ballroom, followed afterwards by a party at Macaulay House. Tuesday, I'm back at Robert Service School to teach some more gut work. Tomorrow night, a bonfire at some more friends' cabin. I've really started to see why, as the local tales go, people come up here for one reason or another, and end up just never leaving. <br>
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<iframe frameborder="no" height="166" scrolling="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/237453360&color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false" width="100%"></iframe>
Above is another, the second of three recordings I made at Blair and Carly's cabin (the skinned squirrel was not part of brunch). Blair is doing vocals and guitar, while Rémi is on banjo doing accompanying vocals. All the assorted brunchers are talking in the background. Hold on with the <i>Three Shades of Black </i>recording, until about 1 minute in when it gets better with really nice harmonizing between Rémi and Blair, and a little bit less background conversation.<br>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Carly.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Evan and Rémi.<br>
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WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-87614286459278473662015-12-12T21:12:00.000-08:002015-12-13T22:01:14.400-08:00hills of gold + white auroraThe light in the Yukon is a peculiar force, particularly at this time of year, when there is hardly any of it. Its appearance, in whatever form becomes a perfect treasure due to its rarity--but also, its behavior is strange and inexplicable. In the past week, even though the darkness has continued daily to lighten into a muted, pale daylight and then wane into the long darkness again, there is no sun to speak of. The entire sky stays low and white. However, fleeting moments of isolated light bursts colour the landscape in queer ways. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A golden glow overtakes a distant mountain during the start of evening twilight. </td></tr>
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Last night I saw the northern lights for the first time since arriving in the Yukon, but they were some atypical aurora borealis: all white. IN fact, it seems they are so atypical that I was told they don't exist, but I am witness to the fact that they do. I was surrounded overhead by a shimmer of gracefully moving white light, a whole airborne community of it. My experience of the northern lights was an initial state of bewilderment, as my mind tried to make sense of what I was seeing, followed by delight once I realized what the strange sight must be. Of course, I had expected to see colours when I did finally see the northern lights, so I didn't understand my eyes at first. I'll dare to be cliché by affirming that they were magical, enlivened by something that defies the senses.<br />
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I was walking home late, after the drag show/ dance at the Yukon Order of Pioneers hall (which was a riot!), around 1am. The streets were empty and the sky was impeccably clear like I hadn't yet seen it in Dawson. I was breathing deeply, star gazing and eyeing stray dogs suspiciously in case they might be wolves and I might have to start putting together a quick defense plan. All I knew was that yelling in a deep voice and acting aggressively might do the trick but then again, might not. I went through a mental file of possibly threatening growl noises I might be able to muster while pants-pissing terrified. Half the dogs here look like wolfy beasts, especially in the dark, and there ARE wolves here. Sometimes dogs go missing.<br />
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As I got further from the party and closer to Macaulay House, I noticed weird glowing areas in the sky, areas that seemed to expand and shift at the edge of the close-by mountains and were strewn out from them. I thought at first that there must be a full moon rising behind the hill because it was bright from behind as if some lit orb was there, but then I remembered that it was a new moon last night and so no moon light could be accountable for anything I was seeing. Then a ribbon of white light rippled across the sky directly over my head and dissipated like smoke. I stood in the road and turned in circles, around and around again, watching the forms play. They were extremely varied, not just ribbons like are typically shown in the photos that manage to capture them, but also in whole wide areas with no apparent source. No matter what scientific explanation there is for the formation and display of the aurora borealis, I tell you firmly again that they are alive beyond the combination of solar flare and floating ice crystals.<br />
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The Tr'ondëk Hwëch'in know this. One of the first things I did when arriving in Dawson was to attend a shadow puppet theatre at the Dänojà Zho Cultural Centre. The entire play was about the spirit of the northern lights, a little girl named Aurora who liked to play with the animals and young people, even though the elders warned them not to. The story was told by Wolf and Raven.<br />
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Current bedtime reading: <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=ehCgQgAACAAJ&dq=fairy%20tales%20angela%20carter&source=gbs_book_other_versions">Angela Carter's Book of Fairy Tales</a>.<br />
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<br />WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-56407498252121008762015-12-11T15:58:00.000-08:002015-12-11T17:13:38.026-08:00a murder at the dumpI discovered a murder at the town dump. Listen below (turn it up and keep reading while it plays):<br />
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I also gleaned a story today from a publication sent to me by the Yukon government - a creation myth about the earth as it began in the town of Old Crow, the next stop north of Dawson City (by plane). I will retell it in my own words, because I believe that no story should be told exactly the same way twice, but I'll tell it true to the original. This myth is from a Vuntut Gwitchin First Nation story, recorded and published by the Yukon Department of Tourism and Culture, but in my words with a little embellishment, here now for you:<br />
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<i>Everyone knows that a very long time ago, the earth was covered in water. In the Time of Water, a bunch of animals lived together on a floating piece of wood. The Crow said he wished that there were some land, a little bit of land that he would magically make grow big enough for everyone to walk firmly on. All of the swimmer animals took turns diving off the wood, into the water and trying to find the bottom where there would be mud to bring back up to The Crow. It was too far down and none of them ever made it back. Well, one made it back, but by the time they pulled him out of the water, he had drowned. Crow picked out the bit of mud from his paw, put a stick in it and floated it on the surface of the water. It grew and grew, and all of the animals stepped onto the new land that was held up by the stick. The stick is still there, holding up all the land, at Old Crow. The Crow doesn't make land anymore, but instead cleans up the messes left on it. </i><br />
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The ravens in Dawson make the noises of pebbles dropping down into a well of water, one at a time. Their wing beats rub the air like the legs of snow pants together in a walk. They scream as if mad witches at each other and at people, no matter who you are or if you might be a witch yourself. They ask throaty questions but they aren't interested in your answers. <br />
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The CBC Yukon interview that Evan and I did yesterday will be aired over the holidays. Chris Windeyer is a top notch human, and it was possibly the most comfortable recorded media interview I've ever done. Likewise, the session I taught at Robert Service School yesterday was a blast. The students were a bit wary at first, but quickly warmed up to mucking around with animal intestine, and made some pretty fabulous first experiments. What is typically just left in the wilderness as food for ravens (caribou gut), might now become an art-making material they can find plenty of during hunting season.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Jeff Koons-esque balloon dog made of hog gut by one of the students.</td></tr>
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WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-16148958597432516012015-12-09T12:06:00.000-08:002015-12-09T12:10:12.161-08:00the lonely saint + sasquatch prints in the snow<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEira1t9HNRbSnr1IGg3pIuSdnYY0eUZPF2Jjx3ld4M-tuF0WETIGy5uCJsbIfCxr7dGNz8dz0CN9QxA7K0o_LTmgLJg3h6A0-PoX_xrZETPujnk0_Q8ch2ya1UPyV7HCiv2pt4hkG4sqxYQ/s1600/IMG_7152.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="177" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEira1t9HNRbSnr1IGg3pIuSdnYY0eUZPF2Jjx3ld4M-tuF0WETIGy5uCJsbIfCxr7dGNz8dz0CN9QxA7K0o_LTmgLJg3h6A0-PoX_xrZETPujnk0_Q8ch2ya1UPyV7HCiv2pt4hkG4sqxYQ/s640/IMG_7152.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #0000ee;"><span style="color: #f3f3f3;">The gorgeous trim at the b<span style="color: #0000ee;"><span style="color: #f3f3f3;">ase of the former </span><span style="color: #0000ee;"><span style="color: #f3f3f3;">home of the first </span><span style="color: #0000ee;"><a href="http://cityofdawson.com/history-pages/michael-gates/is-father-judge-a-forgotten-hero">Dawson Jesuit priest, William Judge</a>.</span></span></span></span><u><br /></u></span></td></tr>
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This Thursday, CBC Yukon host, Chris Windeyer will come to Macaulay House to interview Evan and me. He's coming to visit with us in our studios, to talk about what we're doing in Dawson and how we feel about spending Christmas here. This is a question I should probably find a witty answer to. Perhaps: I'm closer to Santa up here and therefore look forward to getting my presents as soon as Rudolph is out of the gate. Mwah, mwah... I'll keep thinking.<br />
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I'm situated in the upstairs studio at Macaulay House, while Evan, my
co-resident and housemate, has the downstairs studio. Living and working
in a house with another artist like this is an excellent setup. I can
trot downstairs to find Evan, borrow a paintbrush, share a thought
or feeling, or compare notes about the new experiences of
Dawson, including the house ghost. If it were just me and Little Charlotte here day after day, things might get wiggy.<br />
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Speaking of wiggy, tonight I'll be doing some beard-making in my studio with a new friend, Carly. This activity is in preparation for the drag show/ dance this Friday, a fundraiser for the <a href="http://dawsonshiver.com/">(S)hiver Winter Arts Festival</a> happening here next month (unfortunately, I'll miss it). Thursday morning, I'll be teaching an art class at the local high school, Robert Service School. Next week, I teach another one--these are some of the lovely perks of the KIAC residency. There are various art and culture events happening almost every night of the week. I've read previous artists'-in-residence blogs regarding their time here, and they all say the same thing: there's so much going on and the people are so great that it's hard to focus on getting studio work done. It's a halfhearted complaint, though because really, nobody's complaining. Even for a town that's 80% shut down, Dawson, you keep a girl busy.<br />
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So far, my mucking about in the studio has been completely stream of consciousness, with minimal focused production. Mainly, in my first week here, I've been intent on getting the lay of the land in Dawson, expanding the neural cartography I'm drafting of the place, and scouting locations for the abandonment of objects.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Beginning of production.</td></tr>
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I hiked up to the boulder field at the base of Moosehide Slide yesterday, after gawking for a while at the ice bridge being plowed and formed across the frozen Yukon River. I asked the fallen tribe how they were doing under the rubble. All was deathly silent. I also located a lone grave in the woods nearby, next to a humble house--a priest's final resting place, a solo boneyard for the "Saint of Dawson" (very top photo is at this location). I wonder if any sick have been healed by visiting it, or if any other stories exist. There are a few rosaries left draped over the tombstone.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The view of (and from) Moosehide Slide, which keeps on sliding down a bit more each year.</td></tr>
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Negotiating a boulder field covered in snow is a tricky endeavour, one which I undertook as I attempted to climb as far as I could up the rock slide. I followed a set of animal tracks, because I figured the local wildlife would have more wisdom than I about where to step. I really wasn't interested in a twisted ankle out there by myself. I tread carefully along the snowy indentations until I came to a set of <i>very large </i>tracks. They seemed to be two-legged tracks, versus those from a four-legged animal but I'm no wilderness tracker, so I can't be sure. They could have been human-shaped footprints but they also appeared to have the impression of foot pads, like an animal without shoes. I compared my own boot print to the ones I'd discovered and they were drastically bigger and not boot-shaped at all, but foot/paw shaped. At this point, I got a little spooked and decided to end my pursuit there. I scrambled clumsily back down the hillside to the familiarity of human civilization, bumping into a man out with his dogs. They barked and barked and barked at me as I hoofed it out of the hills, like I was a threatening wild animal and I yelled out to him, "They think I'm a sasquatch!"<br />
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<br />WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-17701972897800876052015-12-07T23:51:00.003-08:002015-12-07T23:54:46.417-08:00windows of time<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7sPJKHD8_NQKfT1SZ7hbEQF7FA-G4nUftzQgq46Vrp4h2mLb3wW4xA5dDh3wInfivXBDu3TV0-UNkk_YYuIPTbIOVjbeboO8DbsVqGQzaZiV_DEPnKkfUfR7nIve4EDLF5HF6nHRRYIFc/s1600/FullSizeRender.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7sPJKHD8_NQKfT1SZ7hbEQF7FA-G4nUftzQgq46Vrp4h2mLb3wW4xA5dDh3wInfivXBDu3TV0-UNkk_YYuIPTbIOVjbeboO8DbsVqGQzaZiV_DEPnKkfUfR7nIve4EDLF5HF6nHRRYIFc/s400/FullSizeRender.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A whale of a tail, as seen on my studio window today.</td></tr>
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I have to say, Little Charlotte is a little bit shy. But we're warming up to each other and today, I actually had a sighting... of something. You be the judge:<br />
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I was standing in the kitchen this morning, at the sink by the window, having just woken up. I think I was washing out a cup. It was just the beginning of twilight, when the sky is still deep, dark purple around 9:30am. Outside everything is, for all intents and purposes, still kind of asleep. I was on the phone with my manfriend, like I am every morning about that time. Coffee was on the perk and I was contemplating some of my fresh Macaulay House Bread for breakfast, toasted with almond butter. I had just thrown out the slice of bread that I'd left on the kitchen table overnight for Little Charlotte (which was now rock-hard).<br />
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Strangely, I noticed a figure in the yard just then, seeming to be cutting through, going quite quickly. It was a small person, in a black hood. This isn't so unusual - it's the Yukon - everybody is in hoods this time of year. But I thought it odd that somebody was cutting through the yard like that, going where? I didn't see a face. I dismissed it as maybe a kid on their way to school or something, though the school is in the opposite direction. I commented just then to my manfriend, "Oh, weird! I just saw a little person, looked sort of like an Ewok, pass by the window in front of me, cutting through the yard..." I thought no more of it after that.<br />
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Later on in the afternoon, just around the time of evening twilight, I ventured out through the yard to take some garbage bags and recycling to the locked bin. The yard is fully covered in snow, fairly deep. It was only then that I noticed that there were no footprints in the yard anywhere. I'm serious -- it was pristine. If someone had crossed through, they would have left a trail in the snow. I looked, and looked, and looked some more for traces of that person I saw in the morning twilight. There just weren't any. It didn't snow today, either.<br />
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Dan tells me that it could have been a raven - they're tricksters, you know. I'm not convinced. I've yet to see a raven the size of a little person, though these Yukon ravens are very large. But, Dan also told me that he experienced strange radio alarm clock mischief himself when he stayed here as artist in residence. <br />
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Tomorrow marks one week that I've been in Dawson City and already it feels that time is running out.<br />
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WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-85889119439937037952015-12-06T22:40:00.000-08:002015-12-07T00:23:24.519-08:00soul bread + river talk<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBiW26lkw28gw_-yP3Bso6RslPzvuSsR8kiK3zUvhqBWBHG8-D9az6-8lVsvJA3RGUlmhu6j9DyITybEMUojJmSfnZwxJw_L0wxeUnzdPRDv2i06IrPADZhY8_RS3MBmN1sgOS1XlASDx7/s1600/IMG_6847.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="160" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBiW26lkw28gw_-yP3Bso6RslPzvuSsR8kiK3zUvhqBWBHG8-D9az6-8lVsvJA3RGUlmhu6j9DyITybEMUojJmSfnZwxJw_L0wxeUnzdPRDv2i06IrPADZhY8_RS3MBmN1sgOS1XlASDx7/s640/IMG_6847.jpg" title="© WhiteFeather Hunter" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">An open section of the Klondike River today.</td></tr>
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-begin Q&A- <br />
Below, prime questions one might ask a resident artist at KIAC in December, wondering how in the hell one might cope with the cold and the dark and the isolation and the ghosts, answered by current artist-in-residence, me:<br />
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Q1: Doesn't the lack of light get to you?<br />
A1: No. Full stop. I'm actually finding the dark comforting. Waking up in the dark is a peaceful and gentle way to enter a new day. The twilight is very slow and gradual, and also a mild entry into the daylight hours. It's beautiful and enchanting and exciting, to see any glimpse of colour (pink, gold) along the horizon in this all-white, snowy world. The short days mean that I'm urgently compelled (pressured, even) to get outside and hike around as much as possible before my face starts to freeze. I'm definitely getting more exercise here than in my normal Montreal life. I'm hiking about 2 hours a day, often uphill. The long, dark late afternoons and nights are internal, productive times. I have nothing too much to do but be with myself and to express as much of that as I can, while sipping red wine. <br />
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Q2: How can you handle the cold?<br />
A2: It's not actually that cold. Montreal is colder, it seems. Today was about -13˚ and it felt similar to a Montreal -2˚. It's a tolerable cold, a dry cold, a cold that doesn't settle in the bones like wet cold does. Plus, a person realizes very clearly, once they've equipped themselves adequately for Yukon cold (good Sorel boots, North Face extreme cold gloves/mitts, decent puffy winter jacket, fur hat, plenty of thick socks and thermal leggings, snow pants, hand warmers) just how poorly they were equipped for any kind of cold anywhere else, previous to this. Now I'm properly equipped and I'll never suffer cold toes or fingers or ears again. Trudging around in knee-deep snow is fun again, like it was when I was a kid. I reminisced today about that time when I was young and I peed my snowpants from laughing so hard while playing outside with my friends. The cold here has freed me up to the cold anywhere. Then again, talk to me after -40˚ hits.<br />
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Q3: Wouldn't you rather be with your family or somewhere tropical at Christmas?<br />
A3: Did that last year but yes, I'll miss them. However, I'll be Skyping them in Xmas eve, and my partner is flying in to stay a week with me. One Dawson resident told me recently that December is the most "Dawson-y" time of year: only the hardcore locals have stuck around. The community is small and friendly. People will actually look you in the eye and say hello on the street as if to acknowledge that you're an excellent human being, no matter that they've never seen you before in their lives. People will talk to you everywhere you go, pretty much, if you're the talkative type yourself. Not that there aren't introverts here, because there are, but there's also no fear of strangers. In December, most of Dawson is shut down and boarded up, making for a sleepy existence but for certain there's some serious mischief to be found if you're looking for it, or if you want to create it and invite others over to help you out.<br />
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Q4: How are you managing the ghosts?<br />
A4: See image below. <br />
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-end Q&A-<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My freshly baked loaf of Macaulay House Bread, for Little Charlotte, the hungry ghost.<br />
I had to bake it in a cake pan because there are no bread pans in the house. It turned out perfectly.</td></tr>
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Today during the daylight hours, I followed a snowmobile trail (walking path in the summer, I'm guessing) along the edge of the Yukon River until I got to the Klondike River. The Yukon is completely frozen over, but the Klondike is still open along the edge of the bank. I stopped to take in the view and breathe deeply (because the air is clean here). That's when I noticed that in all this silence, the river is speaking in happy tones. How often does one listen to the pink noise of a river? Well, for me in Montreal, pretty much <i>never</i>. So, I waited and listened for a good long while. That's when I noticed that the trees were talking, too. The golden birches, tightly intertwined with each other, rocked and creaked loudly. I said hello back and decided that this would be one of the locations where I would abandon one of my crystal bone objects (once I make them). I have one other location decided on, too. I also spent time with the crystals of the Yukon. Many ice crystal caves are to be found along the riverbanks. <br />
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I got busy in the studio last night and started playing with hog gut on some of the objects I found here, as well as made some new stuff -- stuff that isn't even really a part of my project idea but might eventually be. I realized how much I've missed just playing in a studio, outside of academia, outside of what needs to be explained to death in an artist statement. I realized just how perfect a thing this artist residency is on the heels of having just defended my master's thesis. I'm free up here, free to play and do nonsensical studio flow and allow some creative idea to unfold on its own without having to think about how I'm going to defend it later. Herein lies the gift of this time and place. <br />
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OH, and one final thing to this long post -- another presence spotted in my bedroom one dark morning... I think he's friendly.<br />
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<br />WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-33020910923417639282015-12-05T23:50:00.002-08:002015-12-06T00:10:33.116-08:00Ravenous Little Charlotte<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I hiked the mountain behind Macaulay House again today, at the beginning of morning twilight, seeking the graveyards that are all clustered together at the very top. Instead of winding along through wooded trails this time, I took the road. Along this road I discovered a murder - and by that I mean evidence of a kill <i>and</i> snow-imprinted traces of ravens' feet everywhere.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From cradle to grave.</td></tr>
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I experience silence here in Dawson like I haven't known in a very long time - the smother of valley and snowfall and an utter absence of wind. It is deep stillness... except for the ravens, of diverse vocabulary and mischievous intentions. I collected a bundle of partridge feathers along the road and up the hill, feathers that the ravens had left behind after devouring their breakfast. These ravens are the size of small dogs in Dawson, so it's no wonder they need a hearty morning meal.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKr-qV9N4ymFJ6z6tviwXSKvhR2n0UH50hOFC7K2NkOpPCZB-dm7pBT-rFDG_SXN7xSS7FumZlArVxO4Q_FB1Np4hnLyZuZdcHmjB6NdUexVbykduTKNyik8FRgeAaSDnoqZCdoeFITJHg/s1600/IMG_6596.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="152" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKr-qV9N4ymFJ6z6tviwXSKvhR2n0UH50hOFC7K2NkOpPCZB-dm7pBT-rFDG_SXN7xSS7FumZlArVxO4Q_FB1Np4hnLyZuZdcHmjB6NdUexVbykduTKNyik8FRgeAaSDnoqZCdoeFITJHg/s640/IMG_6596.jpg" title="© WhiteFeather Hunter" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">All of the graves have their own white picket fences.</td></tr>
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Speaking of meals, I discovered a name for the Macaulay House ghost, at the same time as I discovered a handwritten recipe for "Macaulay House Bread". Her name is <i>Little Charlotte</i>. I keep finding things in this house, and below are scraps of paper I found today in the kitchen:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDwwLUUoQLaxvoDCCycoX2uZyAGU7EUhbWXzPqwUAUtWi0XshvPGVa66xqQgXQbPHclZHoLSpgcEogyxaAPEjD1AD99FvqP2qvVPizFAW4DLiVVoStax-UhQXZypxiDvv8CrXoLzrWb73B/s1600/IMG_6576.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDwwLUUoQLaxvoDCCycoX2uZyAGU7EUhbWXzPqwUAUtWi0XshvPGVa66xqQgXQbPHclZHoLSpgcEogyxaAPEjD1AD99FvqP2qvVPizFAW4DLiVVoStax-UhQXZypxiDvv8CrXoLzrWb73B/s400/IMG_6576.jpg" width="272" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Click image to enlarge.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjesWo7sJWEbYUqD2AHQsMEKWhm8hgBB_h5J0qSkgsl2-A0Ev5FRrwhbmGMGsxHvM6OMNnG2NkcUYApwJx0f9F3eR89bhKXrm_e-Q2IFRh58-XJWLRwiUEMIFKq-Lf8JMX1DpkD3t1VqL3a/s1600/IMG_6577.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="186" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjesWo7sJWEbYUqD2AHQsMEKWhm8hgBB_h5J0qSkgsl2-A0Ev5FRrwhbmGMGsxHvM6OMNnG2NkcUYApwJx0f9F3eR89bhKXrm_e-Q2IFRh58-XJWLRwiUEMIFKq-Lf8JMX1DpkD3t1VqL3a/s320/IMG_6577.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Who is the "him" referred to? Her father?</td></tr>
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Tonight as I walked down the road to go to an event, nobody was on the street except for me. I was late for the event and hurried along in the frosty air. Then suddenly, coming towards me down the middle of the street were two foxes, chasing each other and playing. They had dark brown/black bodies with white ends on their foxy tails. I wanted to follow them, but I had arrived at the ballroom and went inside to hear the music.<br />
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I leave you with this song that randomly appeared on my playlist tonight whilst writing this post - it's the first time I've ever heard it (beautiful and creepily apropos)... Tomorrow (Sunday), I will make some Macaulay House Bread for the hungry ghost, Little Charlotte. I also discovered that she seems more at ease when I leave the radio on in the kitchen.<br />
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WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-76701004064463613712015-12-04T23:40:00.001-08:002015-12-05T09:42:22.727-08:00boneyards + hungry ghosts<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ye olde Yukon Order of Pioneers boneyard. Rotting wooden tombstones stand like ironing boards, off-kilter in the snow.</td></tr>
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Dawson City is a place where cheery, hearty people live with the still-active ghosts of a famous past. The bones of goldrush buildings lean here, there and everywhere - some refurbished and brightly painted but still containing their original features and character, and some nearly collapsed into the ground or leaning against each other in their final ramshackle days. Old lantern slide photos of early miners, women, children, trappers and indigenous peoples are displayed in the buildings that are still used, as well as in the windows of the many boarded-up buildings. The local dive bar is covered floor to ceiling with paintings of local characters from over the years. Nobody here forgets the rich past that built Dawson. And, the past doesn't forget, either.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGY40VKouiTXDhRHmpuuTsWh2tiMvTwljKWiZQKHy5BdRVsPnJaUZBV87F1nlYxlTlMF8UtNPdXToNNKtOCtX7W2CUFkBpuvka4TESGnR9C4HkG24I5kQge8Wz-uNWUmwXr3Zi3YQX9bJ7/s1600/IMG_6575.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="291" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGY40VKouiTXDhRHmpuuTsWh2tiMvTwljKWiZQKHy5BdRVsPnJaUZBV87F1nlYxlTlMF8UtNPdXToNNKtOCtX7W2CUFkBpuvka4TESGnR9C4HkG24I5kQge8Wz-uNWUmwXr3Zi3YQX9bJ7/s640/IMG_6575.jpg" title="© WhiteFeather Hunter" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Live entertainment tonight at "The Pit", one of the only remaining open bars in December.</td></tr>
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As your primer on the ghost situation here at good ole Macaulay House, read <a href="http://www.yukon-news.com/arts/doors-of-dawsons-historic-home-open-to-another-realm">this</a>. Jude Griebel, whom I met in Montreal (because he was going through the MFA program at Concordia at the same time as me, but a year or two ahead of me), collected all the stories from former residents about the ghosts at Macaulay. Well, now I have some new ones of my own to add. <br />
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I met a local indigenous woman in Whitehorse, on my way to Dawson, whom I spoke to about ghosts. She told me that she was always told to feed crackers to ghosts, and to talk to them. I told her that one story of the ghost in Macaulay House that I've heard of, is that there was a young woman who once lived here, and she refused to marry the man her father wanted her to marry, so he locked her up in one of the bedrooms and let her starve to death. Hungry ghosts, imprisoned in a last state of injustice. <br />
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I can tell you from my experiences thus far at Macaulay, that the ghost has something to say, is pretty tech savvy and is trying to communicate with me through music and electronic devices. Three times yesterday, while I was sitting in my studio, my phone, asleep on the desk beside me, randomly started playing a song. The music app WASN'T EVEN OPEN. I couldn't find a way to shut the song off, either. The first song that played itself: <i>The Last Beat of My Heart</i> by Souxsie and the Banshees. You seriously can't make this shit up. <br />
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The second time it happened, even though I went through and shut off EVERY app on my phone, the song she selected to play for me was, <i>Crystalline </i>by Björk.<br />
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Underneath our feet</div>
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Crystals grow like plants</div>
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(listen how they grow)</div>
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I'm blinded by the lights</div>
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(listen how they grow)</div>
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In the core of the earth</div>
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(listen how they grow)</div>
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Crystalline</div>
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Internal nebula</div>
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(Crystalline)</div>
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Rocks growing slow mo</div>
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(Crystalline)</div>
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I conquer claustrophobia</div>
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(Crystalline)</div>
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And demand the light</div>
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The third time, she got funny with me. The song that played was, <i>What's the Buzz? </i>from the Jesus Christ Superstar soundtrack.<br />
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The buzz is this: My co-resident and housemate, Evan Sabourin, is organizing a hungry ghost party/ music jam/ performance event at our place (in his studio downstairs) this Sunday. He'll be performing the role of hungry ghost for the assembled guests. As for me, I'll be leaving out a plate of crackers in the kitchen tonight.<br />
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<span style="font-size: small;">End note: Lest I come across as simply hysterical, I have to add that I did my due diligence on this matter and Googled something to the effect of: "why the hell is my phone randomly playing songs?" and discovered that there are one or two other people out there on the Internet who are convinced that their phones are possessed for similar reasons. It seems that ghosts have discovered a new medium for communication, effectively turning electronic communication devices into a contemporary ouija boards. </span>WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-47342693433249803482015-12-03T15:17:00.001-08:002015-12-04T23:50:08.074-08:00the twilight zoneI am utterly smitten with Yukon morning twilight. The sky shifts from black to dark purple, to various shades of neon pink to yellow to daylight over the course of an hour, from around 10-11am. It isn't fully light out till 11:30ish. I relish this waking in the dark, the quiet space at the beginning of the day when I can drink coffee alone in my studio and wait to watch the slowly changing colours outside.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGNl2ObnaftJfuwiV6b4OZEgXbUQLwH4sBwmsNaVBTpQNMs0dXkNX0WD7Lbm8FaOO6fTlFQTVOVzH0kEeA68Lhelo2Za9icNsswRNFWzi-jRn6P1FWPoSnt9uDaMjUcYbg-lCwD4eZSsmp/s1600/IMG_6508.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="162" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGNl2ObnaftJfuwiV6b4OZEgXbUQLwH4sBwmsNaVBTpQNMs0dXkNX0WD7Lbm8FaOO6fTlFQTVOVzH0kEeA68Lhelo2Za9icNsswRNFWzi-jRn6P1FWPoSnt9uDaMjUcYbg-lCwD4eZSsmp/s640/IMG_6508.JPG" title="© WhiteFeather Hunter" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My studio - and the beginning of morning twilight in the windows.</td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigsoNuZMtuQP0FLo0k990es4v4I3HWS441Ap-DTlN3XFZaIgZm01JmASxKJdbaAfvp1c7nESwX1uPB4MmIgLGAtIElhxAGikVfX4CFvDAaFJAOp_nvv_jVVdTwYyfz61Mf7FhlhVlDvMdC/s1600/IMG_6456.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigsoNuZMtuQP0FLo0k990es4v4I3HWS441Ap-DTlN3XFZaIgZm01JmASxKJdbaAfvp1c7nESwX1uPB4MmIgLGAtIElhxAGikVfX4CFvDAaFJAOp_nvv_jVVdTwYyfz61Mf7FhlhVlDvMdC/s400/IMG_6456.jpg" title="© WhiteFeather Hunter" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The first peek of daylight, as seen from my east-facing studio window.</td></tr>
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Below are a few items found in the studio, as I was thoroughly cleaning and clearing it out (I can't focus/work in cluttered space). I also found strips of hot red acetate and bottle green glass, which I have catching light in both of my studio windows (red acetate shown in the window above).</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8_eAdTTcMA_sOOm7I2DcabL-T1ouaOPa4m63mhv5GeQ-HurKJ6YMlNBkeemrXptLG4u7KMFhDZVNl9j_962KV9maf6W69eVdhVis3POE6G4poizrZdLLvMfsVewaMTf7uURoJSuNtzQWG/s1600/IMG_6503.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8_eAdTTcMA_sOOm7I2DcabL-T1ouaOPa4m63mhv5GeQ-HurKJ6YMlNBkeemrXptLG4u7KMFhDZVNl9j_962KV9maf6W69eVdhVis3POE6G4poizrZdLLvMfsVewaMTf7uURoJSuNtzQWG/s640/IMG_6503.jpg" title="© WhiteFeather Hunter" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I adore this collection of items: a piece of mirror acetate, weird wire forms, watercolour sketches, and my most fave, the watercolour shaman. I don't know who created the sketches, but I will do something with them.</td></tr>
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For now, I've started refreshing my beading skills with seed beads that I bought at the Dänojà Zho Cultural Centre yesterday. I plan to incorporate some crusted beady areas into my sculptures: </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLUtXAdHTLzNB96T5_Sw9FJjmfspvQRi7U4Fozbce6I8AeU4u-Wy4GqapqEyESCn1ugA6xl5sWPk2b0U2wA6MvRJ8boiUzAY34xdv9pJgEB-nvhAxoApRVj6K9thnit_bpqz9rjOdcQCGA/s1600/IMG_6516.JPG" imageanchor="1"><img alt="" border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLUtXAdHTLzNB96T5_Sw9FJjmfspvQRi7U4Fozbce6I8AeU4u-Wy4GqapqEyESCn1ugA6xl5sWPk2b0U2wA6MvRJ8boiUzAY34xdv9pJgEB-nvhAxoApRVj6K9thnit_bpqz9rjOdcQCGA/s640/IMG_6516.JPG" title="© WhiteFeather Hunter" width="480" /> </a></div>
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Last night I had the pleasure of participating in film selections for the <a href="http://www.dawsonfilmfest.com/">Dawson City International Short Film Festival</a> that happens in the Spring. The selections happen at KIAC in their classroom, which is set up with a huge TV and wine and snacks, and interested community members (most in this community are artists) are invited to screen some of the films and vote/score. Usually ten films are shown per night. The score cards are collected and used by the jury to help make the shortlist for the final selections. These screenings happen twice a week, so I'll be attending more! SUPER FUN perk of being here as artist-in-residence. </div>
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To end and bring the topic back to the twilight zone, in the next post I'll talk about the house ghost here at Macaulay House where resident artists stay. I dare say I've had some communication already.</div>
WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-2422426344286953952015-12-02T23:42:00.000-08:002015-12-04T23:50:34.183-08:00<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdNr7vG7ZU3yl8lF6Al03WMn3Fk3go3vp_Ub0i3ga42eE0w2T1cZlmlN7vZtHOW6hdaPbYp9YsUxkf9i9slt-l-4hziYV78PyfGKiW4eHAbGzMDs4hkM4IOD3sieQS1ibCKk4QvLTAsG3L/s1600/IMG_6461.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdNr7vG7ZU3yl8lF6Al03WMn3Fk3go3vp_Ub0i3ga42eE0w2T1cZlmlN7vZtHOW6hdaPbYp9YsUxkf9i9slt-l-4hziYV78PyfGKiW4eHAbGzMDs4hkM4IOD3sieQS1ibCKk4QvLTAsG3L/s320/IMG_6461.jpg" title="© WhiteFeather Hunter" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My new digs at the corner of Princess and 7th.</td></tr>
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<h4>
I collected my first Dawson City bone story on the drive from the tiny Dawson airport into the village.</h4>
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<i>Side note: </i><br />
<i>I almost didn't make it to Dawson on the first try, because the ceiling was too low when we lifted off from Whitehorse. That meant that the plane wouldn't be able to land, extending the flight to a round trip to the far northern reaches of Inuvik, in the hopes that on the way back back down south, the cloud cover would lift. In the end, by the time we reached the air above Dawson, the sky had lifted a bit and the plane was able to land. So, I arrived on time but some of my luggage didn't. The plane is so small that one must pay to bring anything weighing over the allowed 44 lbs. I paid an extra $50 for my suitcase full of art supplies, which arrived today after room was found on another plane for it. </i><br />
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Dan Sokolowski, the KIAC residency coordinator, picked me up from the airport and gave me a quick tour of the town before getting me settled in to the residence. And as he drove, he told me a story about one of Dawson City's landmarks. <b>At the edge of town, overlooking the Yukon River, is a natural rock slide formation down the side of one of the hills/mountains, called <i>Moosehide Slide</i>. Legend has it that a long time ago, before the gold rush brought all the miners and settlers, an enemy tribe was camped out at the base of the mountain. The </b><b>Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in prayed to the tree gods for help, and so, the trees on the mountainside lifted their roots and let go, and a massive rock slide tumbled down and completely covered the camp of the enemy tribe, burying them all alive. Their bones are believed to be still all there. </b><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjd4aaEjmdyFptohbmqArcU_S9x-m2PIAOGbmWZUp0lhY2viAFdvmMkYvvZCKn963mlGjFv_v5VI4ZRCwBegJfaDV9i71ho0_JEk8-HAAASd-5x1n3JVRuyfaqVMdBK_l-dbfliEylxdDi3/s1600/IMG_6487.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="136" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjd4aaEjmdyFptohbmqArcU_S9x-m2PIAOGbmWZUp0lhY2viAFdvmMkYvvZCKn963mlGjFv_v5VI4ZRCwBegJfaDV9i71ho0_JEk8-HAAASd-5x1n3JVRuyfaqVMdBK_l-dbfliEylxdDi3/s640/IMG_6487.jpg" title="© WhiteFeather Hunter" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Today's peak daylight, overlooking the frozen Yukon River. To the far right, the Moosehide Slide.<br />
To the left, the lovely Dänojà Zho Cultural Centre.</td></tr>
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<br />WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117069461529871157.post-38213597547590603992015-11-26T17:00:00.001-08:002015-11-27T20:05:00.008-08:00Preliminary research: existing klondike osteobiographies<ul>
<li><a href="http://www.whitehorsestar.com/History/horse-remains-found-near-dawson-city-are-26000-years-old">26,000 year old horse bones found in Dawson City.</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/customer-swallows-human-toe-in-dawson-city-bar-1.1331325">Swallowing a human toe in Dawson City.</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/bones-discovered-in-yukon-tell-tale-of-klondike-justice/article1314028/">Bones of Gold Rush murderers, the first men executed in the Yukon, found in Dawson City.</a></li>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://yukon-news.com/letters-opinions/this-lady-lets-the-bones-tell-the-story"><i>This lady lets the bones tell the story.</i></a> </li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/yukon-first-nation-wants-bones-reburied-1.1060826"><i>Yukon First Nation wants bones reburied.</i> </a> </li>
</ul>
<li><a href="http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/klondike-miners-uncover-evolutionary-treasure-the-first-ancient-western-camel-bones-in-decades">Rare, ice-age Western camel bones found near gold mine outside of Dawson City.</a></li>
<ul>
<li><i><a href="http://mbe.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2015/05/27/molbev.msv128.abstract?sid=fd87b74b-a197-417f-b5c1-e8b56f1d6109">Genomic data from extinct North American Camelops revise camel evolutionary history. </a></i></li>
</ul>
<li><a href="http://whatsupyukon.com/communities/NorthtotheKlondike/miners-have-a-bone-to-pick-with-pre-history/#sthash.WhNRovmM.dpbs">The historical link between gold miners and paleontologists in the Klondike.</a></li>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://uphere.ca/articles/fossil-gold-mines"><i>Fossil Gold Mines</i></a> </li>
</ul>
<li><a href="http://www.tc.gov.yk.ca/publications/ice_age_klondike_2011.pdf"><i>Ice Age Klondike; Fossil Treasures from the Frozen Ground</i>. </a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.beringia.com/research/index.html">Research publications (.pdf) on Beringia and fossil finds.</a></li>
<li><i><a href="http://pubs.aina.ucalgary.ca/arctic/arctic55-2-143.pdf">Evidence for Human Modification of a Late Pleistocene Bison Bone From the Klondike District, Yukon Territory, Canada.</a></i></li>
<li><a href="http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/120131102519.htm">30,000 year old permafrost bison bones in the Yukon.</a></li>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://yukon-news.com/news/bison-jaw-unearthed-from-outhouse-hole">Ancient bison bones discovered while digging a hole for an outhouse in the Yukon.</a><i><a href="http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/01/120131102519.htm"> </a></i></li>
</ul>
<li><a href="http://www.inmagine.com/imagebrokerrm-097/ptg01141087-photo">Online artifact/ bone archive (Yukon).</a></li>
<li><i><a href="http://www.geosociety.org/gsatoday/archive/19/8/article/i1052-5173-19-8-4.htm">The Klondike goldfields and Pleistocene environments of Beringia. </a></i></li>
<li><a href="http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/hunting-for-a-mammoth-in-yukon/"><i>Hunting for a Mammoth in the Yukon.</i></a></li>
<li><a href="http://lamokaledger.com/gold-miners-find-trove-of-pleistocene-animal-bones/">The stench of Yukon placer mines, due to unearthed ancient bones and carcass.</a></li>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.ca/2011/11/dna-frozen-in-permafrost-muck-reveals.html#.VlkNQMoQg4Q">More on the "wretched smell that you pick up about a hundred metres away, long before you see anything."</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.macleans.ca/authors/john-geddes/melting-yukon-ices-reveals-5000-year-old-archaeological-treasures/">Ancient bone and wooden tools revealed in the Yukon by a barnyardy smell. </a></li>
</ul>
<li><a href="http://yukon-news.com/news/yukons-little-furry-botanists-win-acclaim">Uncovering arctic ground squirrel nests, full of ice age plants and bones, in the Yukon permafrost.</a></li>
<li><a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=R0wuBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA50&lpg=PA50&dq=dawson+city+bones&source=bl&ots=3BZ0J1nndC&sig=dut2c46awyHXFGX4fE9qwD2O8dQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwixw7vilrLJAhWIHT4KHZEEDWM4HhDoAQg1MAQ#v=onepage&q=dawson%20city%20bones&f=false">A history of unmarked graves in Dawson City.</a></li>
<li><i><a href="http://www.tc.gov.yk.ca/publications/dawson_cemetaries_wt.pdf">A Walking Tour of Dawson City Cemeteries.</a></i> </li>
</ul>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBfKLk0fSkHttcW1KKBEm4yi2y1qzT93RcVyYO7FcT2SClAi2HGCF8tD0j2mdsyhSE5DPD8Ep72Vf_QDyq4E5l8biIqfqaj62yvN4Sa6c6psSz2xcjgEua7z2VQb531NxoQPTLL91cPb19/s1600/klondike+bones.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="179" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBfKLk0fSkHttcW1KKBEm4yi2y1qzT93RcVyYO7FcT2SClAi2HGCF8tD0j2mdsyhSE5DPD8Ep72Vf_QDyq4E5l8biIqfqaj62yvN4Sa6c6psSz2xcjgEua7z2VQb531NxoQPTLL91cPb19/s400/klondike+bones.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Click to enlarge to full size.</td></tr>
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<i> </i> WhiteFeather Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08499696941696962262noreply@blogger.com0