Art, Art, & More Art!!!!

This page is dedicated to all Native ancestors everywhere. This is a small accumulation of the work that Old Bear Grinning has created in the past 4+ decades. Although some of these pictures do not do the actual piece much justice, we still wanted to share with you all that we could. This work is Yellow or Red Cedar with varying combinations of finishing mediums and painting styles. Old Bear has started to try different wood types such as Alder, Cherry, Linden, Holly and Red Wood, which we have place on other pages of the site.

One of the greatest gifts to the Northwest Coast Native people was the red cedar tree - a source of some of the finest materials for making objects of use and beauty. Magnificent in itself, with a beautifully flared base that tapers suddenly to a tall, straight trunk with reddish brown bark, the red cedar gracefully sweeps it boughs of grey-green needles. The wood is soft with a wonderful firmness that permeates a most incredible odour, so pleasing to the human sense of smell. A good cedar tree will split true and clean into forty-foot planks with scarcely a knot. Red cedar has the widest colour spectrum of any wood – from blonde through to pink and chocolate brown. When steamed, it will bend without breaking. From birth to death, the wood, bark, roots and leaves of this mystical powerful cedar tree provides generously for the needs of the Native people – materially, ceremonially and medicinally.