ABSTRACT

A t a conference on Native American and Folk art, in a lake-side setting in central New York State, these lines from Burnt Norton,

the first of T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets, were quoted by one of the speakers: Doreen Jensen, an artist and writer of the Gitksan people of Northern British Columbia. Her talk was on Freddie Alexie, an artist of an older generation and another people - the Tsimshian - who had painted scenes of life in his native Port Simpson some ten decades ago. Many influences informed his work: the Tsimshian artistic tradition itself, European painting, print-making and wood-carving, Japanese prints.