White Mountain Part I.. there will be others.

I arrived in the village of White Mountain, Alaska on Wednesday January 16th to report on their annual Artists in Schools Program.
I departed Nome around 3 pm on Bering Air, and arrived in White Mountain (WMO) approximately thirty minutes later. The plane ride was brief over the white mass that is Western Alaska. It was difficult to identify the beach, and where they water began and the land ended, since everything is coated with snow and ice.

I was picked up on the WMO air strip by a woman on a snowmachine, she was looking to load in the mail from the plane. So she loaded up and I hopped on to have my first snowmachine ride. Those Texas 4-wheeling trips really came in handy, hold on tight with the thighs and lean.

I told the Bering Air agent to drop me off at the school, and her response was 'which one?'
'There is more than one in a village with 150 people?' was my first thought. Then she approached a two story building that looked like a house, and told me that most people stay at the elementary school when they visit for the radio. So, I trusted her experience and gathered my things from the basket she pulled from behind and went inside.

Immediately I was approached by students, wondering who I was and where I was from. I suppose in a small village it is obvious when a new face appears. I met the teachers and was pointed in the direction of the administrator's office. I dropped my stuff, bundled back up and started the snowy walk down the hill.

The old high school burned down about two years before so the high school and school offices are in a trailer right down a snowmachine road from the elementary school house. About this time the sun seemed to be hovering above the tree line and the frozen Fish River. It seemed like it could be the early evening, but not during this time in Western Alaska, it was around 4 pm.

Walking in I was, once again, immediately welcomed and given some background on what was going on, then I was pointed on another direction. Once again I head out to the city offices building/library, where Moses Wassilie was holding his art classes.

Moses is a Yupik artists from a village near the Bethel area. He has over 20 years of teaching experience.Wassilie is not only a painter but a mask maker, ivory carver, and dabbles in photography and movies.




This is Moses with one of his masks. This one in particular was made for his mother, she passed away two years ago and he has made one every year for her.He views it as a way to keep a living memory.

The hair on the brow is wolf fur, to represent his old tribal clan.
The five wooden feathers are made out of zebra wood from Africa. They represent the digits and earth, wind, water, fire and heart.
The Cross on the front of the mask represents her spirituality.
The white on the nose is a kayak.
The earrings are a traditional style that he would make for his mother.

The community and students were learning a variety of things from Wassilie. The principal was involved with carving, some women from the community tried painting for the first time and the students in the high school made drums.