Skip to content
Menu
Lucky's Bookshelf
  • Browse
  • About
Lucky's Bookshelf

Book Review: Northwest Coast Indian Art by Bill Holm

Posted on February 20, 2022April 11, 2022
Topics: Arts and Music, Indigenous, Nonfiction

Rating: 7.7/10.

Northwest Coast Indian Art: An Analysis of Form by Bill Holm

An analysis of the formline style of art by the Pacific Northwest Indians including the Haida, Tlingit, and Tsimshian tribes. The ancient art was forgotten until its revival relatively recently, when people studied old works to deduce the patterns so that new artwork can be produced according to the same rules. This book, originally published in 1965, was based on the author’s graduate research, and eventually served as a handbook for indigenous artists wanting to produce their own tribe’s art.

Northwest Coast art is symbolic (not realistic) and has a system of idioms with a grammar of how they can be combined. Black is typically the primary color and used for the formlines, red is the secondary color, and blue-green is the tertiary color. The formlines should be connected together, avoid retaining the same width for a long distance, there should be gaps when two formlines are joined together. The book first gives a technical description of formlines, ovoids, U-shapes, and how they are combined together; then, it goes into principles of composition such as symmetry and use of empty space.

See more views on Amazon.com

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Reddit
  • Twitter

Most similar books:

21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act by Bob Joseph Visual Intelligence by Amy Herman The Language of the Inuit by Louis-Jacques Dorais Johann Sebastian Bach: The Learned Musician by Christoph Wolff

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Search

Enjoying these books?

Join our mailing list to receive weekly book reviews!

No spam, unsubscribe at any time

Check your inbox or spam folder to confirm your subscription.

Subjects

  • Meta (2)
  • Topics (227)
    • Arts and Music (12)
    • Business / Finance (25)
    • Canada (11)
    • China (17)
    • Current Events (8)
    • Data Science / ML (8)
    • Economics (11)
    • History (27)
    • Indigenous (9)
    • Linguistics (17)
    • Mathematics (5)
    • Medicine / Health (14)
    • Natural Sciences (20)
    • Philosophy (15)
    • Self-Help / Career (12)
    • Social Sciences (12)
    • Software Engineering (3)
    • Startups (12)
    • World (22)
  • Type (244)
    • Classics (18)
    • Nonfiction (162)
    • Novels / Fiction (29)
    • Textbooks (36)

Lucky’s Bookshelf is a participant of the Amazon Affiliates Program.

©2023 Lucky's Bookshelf | Powered by SuperbThemes & WordPress