Masks express drama of emotions

From pase 24
day that he'was going to do
“sculpture tor architecture.”

Everybody at the table laughed
because “this was a far-out idea
in those days,”” especially con-
sidering “there wasn’t even any
architecture in Vancouver at that
time!"

Whether he was following his
father's advice or whether he sim-
ply had no other option aiter
graduation, Koochin worked at a
variety of jobs that had little to do
with art.

These included working on caon-
struction sites and building sets for
the CBC. It was net until 1956-57
when he travelled and studied in
Europe that his commiiment tc the
life of the professional artist
became firm.

Paris, as it has done for so many
other creative spirits, reinforced
his confidence in the cultural in-
tegrity of the artist and revived his
determination to make a career
out of the arts,

The result was a host of solo ex-
hibitions from Montreal to Van-
couver, and a distinguished career
as sculpture-instructor at the Emily
Carr College of Art and Design.

Koochin’s art has since made its
way inio public collections at the
Museum ot Civilization in Ottawa.
the Vancouver Art Gallery, and
the University of Oregon, as well
as 2 great many pnvate collections
across Canada.

Much at Koochin’s work may be
characterized as the art of
retrieval,

Immediately after his trip to the
Soviet Union, which he and his
wife Eileen toured in 1976 in an

effort to recover Koochin’s Russian
heritage, he turned ta carving
variations of the Russian kovsh, a
wooden bow! in the shape of a
tat-bellied bird which svmbolized
the coming of spring in ancient
folk art tradition.

The prodigious skilis Koochin
developed there were applied to
other recovery work, this time to
bringing back the mask-making
tradition of native Canadian
shamanism,

Koochin has a strong intuitive
understanding of the ancient func-
tion of the mask, of the way it
discloses the psychulogical bearing
of the wearer whiie at the same
time generating the aura of an
cther.vise hidden god.

Though less formalized and
aloof than the traditional type
because they are modelled from
the expressive faces of his friends,
Koochin’s masks express the uni-
versal drama of emotions.

Of particular importance in this
regard is his rendering of hair, a

Women's assoned nylon crinkle

jackets, S.M.L.

swirling mass of grooves and
furrows that sometimes threatens
to engult the heads and taces
beneath.

The artist works magic with the
skin tones which give these pieces
a compelling sensuous immediacy,
While expertly incorporating the
natural wood grains into the char-
acter of the masks to suggest
another dimension, a history larger
than ail of us.

Bill Koochin is one of five anisty
invited by his old friend, Bill Reid,
te participate in an exhibition
commemorating the installation of
Reid’s sculpture. The Spirit of
Haida Gwai, at the Canadian Em-
bassy in Washington. D.C. Sched-
uled for September of this vear,
the show is titled, The Well Made
Object. This is a fitting description
jor everything Koochin makes.

“A well-crafted piece,’’ he says
ponderausly, emphasizing the im-
portance of craft in artistic expres-
sion, ‘should be taken for
granted.”

B Men's knit shirts in
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Wednesday, June 19, 1991 - North Shore News - 29

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