Through the Looking Glass

By Micheal Rios, Tulalip News

There is something mesmerizing about glass. Feed it enough heat and a solid becomes liquid. Give that molten material air, movement, and the practiced hands of an artist, then it can become nearly anything imaginable. A basket. A salmon. A raven. A spindle whorl. A turtle suspended in motion.

And when Indigenous artists take hold of that medium, glass becomes something else entirely. It becomes a vessel for culture.

This fall, inland northwest art lovers will have the rare opportunity to experience that intersection of fire, light, and innovation when Clearly Indigenous: Native Visions Reimagined in Glass arrives at the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture (MAC) in Spokane.

Opening October 24 and remaining on view through January 10, the traveling exhibition features more than 120 works by 33 Indigenous artists from North America, Australia and New Zealand, alongside works by legendary glass artist Dale Chihuly. The exhibition brings together an astonishing variety of techniques and cultural perspectives, transforming one of the art realm’s most visually dramatic mediums into a showcase of Indigenous storytelling. 

For Coast Salish viewers in particular, there will be familiar forms waiting behind the glass. Lummi artist Dan Friday turns the imagery and teachings of his Coast Salish heritage into blown glass. Tlingit artists Preston Singletary and Raven Skyriver push the medium in completely different directions, from Singletary’s bold Northwest Coast forms to Skyriver’s remarkably lifelike marine creatures. Meanwhile, Musqueam artist Susan Point reimagines Coast Salish design and traditional objects through fashionable materials, including glass.

Collectively, they represent a generation of artists who refused the idea that Indigenous art must remain fixed in a particular material or century to remain authentic. That premise lies at the heart of Clearly Indigenous.

When Native artists began experimenting with studio glass during the 1970s, some collectors and critics questioned whether their work could even be considered “authentic” Native art. Half a century later, that notion seems almost laughable. Indigenous glass artists are now internationally recognized. Their works are held by museums and private collections around the world, while the stories carried within their creations remain rooted in their respective cultures. 

The exhibition traces that transformation across roughly 45 years of Native glassmaking.

Its story is closely connected to the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, where Chihuly served as a visiting professor in 1974. Already an influential figure in the growing American studio glass movement, Chihuly constructed the institute’s first hot shop and introduced Indigenous students to glassblowing. That convergence helped bring together two creative movements, Native art and studio glass, both developing during the latter half of the twentieth century.

Since then, Native artists have made the illustrious medium their own. Pueblo pottery forms were reborn in translucent glass. Woven baskets became glowing vessels. Traditional textile patterns appeared within glass panels. Northwest Coast spirits emerged from layers of blown and sand-carved color. Stories once expressed through cedar, wool, clay, stone and paint found another way to travel forward.

That ability to carry culture into a new material is beautifully illustrated by Dan Friday. A Lummi Nation citizen and Skagit Valley-based artist, Friday has worked primarily in glass for approximately three decades. His resumé spans teaching and residencies at institutions ranging from Pilchuck Glass School and the University of Washington to the Museum of Glass and the Burke Museum. In 2017, he also created a Native youth outreach program at Pilchuck. 

Friday describes creativity as something nurtured within his family from childhood, when making things by hand and knowing Lummi cultural heritage were simply parts of everyday life.

His eventual introduction to glass proved transformational.

“When I saw glass blowing for the first time, it felt as though I grew an inch!” reads Friday’s artist statement. “That is to say, a huge weight was lifted from my shoulders. I had finally figured out my path. I found my passion in glass.”

That sense of discovery can be felt throughout Clearly Indigenous. Consider Friday’s glass baskets, where forms associated with Northwest Coast weaving are reconstructed through heat and breath. Or Susan Point’s Beaver Woman Transformation Spindle Whorl, where an object connected to Coast Salish textile traditions becomes kiln-slumped and sand-etched glass. Raven Skyriver’s sea creatures appear almost alive, capturing the marine world that has sustained coastal Native peoples since time immemorial. 

Then there is Preston Singletary. The internationally renowned Tlingit artist has spent decades demonstrating just how naturally Northwest Coast visuals can inhabit glass. His work ranges from towering sculptural forms to ravens, killer whales and objects grounded in Tlingit story and design. One piece highlighted for the Spokane exhibition is his Raven Rattle, a blown, hot-sculpted and sand-carved work created in 2019. 

“My work challenges the notion that Native artists must only use traditional materials,” explains Singletary. “By embracing glass as a storytelling medium, I seek to affirm our presence and identity, reinforcing that Indigenous cultures are dynamic, evolving, and rooted in resilience. Through my art, I strive to amplify Indigenous voices, ensuring that we are seen, heard, and recognized on our own terms.”

Glass adds another participant to those stories, light. Unlike cedar or stone, it can glow from within. It can absorb sunlight, throw shadows across a wall or reveal different layers depending on where a person stands. Singletary has described discovering this quality while observing sunlight pass through one of his pieces, creating ever-changing shapes and shadows. 

That interplay gives Clearly Indigenous an almost living quality.

Yet for all its visual beauty, the exhibition is about more than technical mastery. The works address identity, environmental concerns, cultural continuity, ancestors, community and present-day Native life. Some speak through familiar traditional forms. Others make pointed statements about the worlds Indigenous people walk in today. 

The exhibition originated at the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture in Santa Fe, where it was curated by Dr. Letitia Chambers and Potawatomi artist Cathy Short. After opening in Santa Fe in 2022, the show evolved into a traveling exhibition and recently completed a run at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian in New York. 

Now it is heading west. And there is something particularly fitting about Clearly Indigenous landing in Washington State, which is home to several of the Native artists represented within the exhibition.

For Tulalip families willing to make the drive east to Spokane, this is the type of exhibition capable of appealing across generations. Artists will appreciate the craftsmanship. Culture bearers will recognize old forms taking on new dimensions. Young people might see proof that ancestral teachings do not belong solely to the past. They can be carried into whatever comes next.

Because glass, for all its reputation as something fragile, begins with tremendous heat. So too does creativity. Within Clearly Indigenous, Native artists have taken that creative fire and used it to illuminate a wide-ranging, 120-piece exhibition.

“Living as an artist may not be directly saving the world, but perhaps we are saving ourselves and hopefully, in the process, making the world a better place,” concludes Friday. Offering a glimpse into his artistic drive.

Clearly Indigenous: Native Visions Reimagined in Glass is currently scheduled for display October 24 through January 10, 2027 at the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture in Spokane. The museum is open Tuesday through Sunday from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., with extended hours on the final Wednesday of each month.