Sabrina Hou was a master artist for ACTA’s Apprenticeship Program in 2007 with apprentice, Janice Ng. Hou studied Kunqu opera, the oldest form of Chinese folk opera, at the Beijing Opera Conservatory and performed with the Beijing Northern Kunqu Opera Theater before moving to the United States ten…
The Tolowa Dee-ni’ People have lived in Del Norte since recorded time. In 1853, an attack by settlers, was documented as the second single largest massacre of Native peoples in the history of the United States. The ensuing carnage caused a near extinction of people and…
In 2006, master artist Holly Hensher taught apprentice Paula Allen to make a Karuk women’s maple bark skirt. Used in tribal ceremonies, Karuk women’s maple bark skirts are made from the innermost layer of bark of the big leaf maple trees found within the Karuk ancestral territories. Hensher began weaving…
Master artist Glenn Moore, Sr. taught his grandson, Glenn Moore, Jr. to make a Yurok hand-carved redwood dugout canoe as part of ACTA’s Apprenticeship Program in 2006. Used in Yurok and Hoopa ceremonies, master and apprentice carved the canoe from an old-growth redwood tree. Glenn Moore Sr. learned to carve canoes…
ACTA is deeply saddened to learn of Luwana Quitiquit’s passing in December of 2011. *** “It’s really important to be able to focus on your basket. If you aren’t in that positive space and you are working on a basket every little mistake that you make is pretty much an…
For Indian tribes of Northwestern California the art form of making female regalia, particularly ceremonial dresses was nearly lost. As native people fight against cultural erasure to retain their languages and cultural practices, the art form of regalia making, fortunately, has regained a high frequency of practice in the current…
The Nor Rel Muk Wintu Nation’s traditional homeland lies in the headwaters of the South Fork of the Trinity River, in Trinity County, California. Approximately half of the tribe’s 1,000 members still live near their ancestral lands in Trinity and Shasta Counties. Nor Rel Muk Wintu members from across the…
Basket weaving was once an everyday skill used by the Native peoples of Northern California. Today, basketry has become a highly specialized art form with a limited number of tribal people who possess the skill and knowledge the gather materials, process those materials, and create a living basket. Baskets are…
The far northern region of California (Humboldt and Siskoyou Counties) is the homeland of the Hupa and Karuk tribes, who have been vigilant in sustaining cultural practices related to a mode of life to which the Klamath tributary is central. Ritual and ceremony of renewal continue to be integrated in…
Wilverna Reece (Karuk) has been weaving baskets since 1978. She was taught by Karuk tribal elders Grace and Madeline Davis in Happy Camp, California. Wilverna is proficient in the skills and knowledge needed to weave many types of Karuk baskets, and has been teaching weaving to community members since 1983.
