.. by Gathie Falk.

The Indian of today should be sculpting beer cans out of argylite, or,
better still, out of scrap car parts.

It is not that there aren't any more bears, eagles, and mountain lions,
or that an acquaintance with bears, eagles, and mountain lions is to be
regretted in this day; the reason for my assertion is that many Indians
are more intimately acquainted with the beer can and the village scrap
heap of dead cars than they are with the struggle for survival against
wild beasts.

Parenthetically, this is not intended to be a criticism of Indian living
habits or of the change in their living habits; everyone's living habits
have changed within the last hundred years; it is mostly a criticism of
the source of the usual Indian artist's inspiration and of our accept-
ance of the validity of his work when he is using the motifs of his
forefathers.

This romantic idealization of and concern with, earlier pursuits is
something that might have been paralleled by Michaelangelo's finding
himself a nice cave and drawing hunters with primitive weapons
chasing primitive animals.

Anyone can, of course, make anything he likes and call it art, but for
the sake of impact it is necessary that the artist be acquainted with
his subject to the point of saturation.

I am making gift boxes out of clay and painting them with acrylic
paint, aluminum paint, enamel, and lucite. Sometimes, when I want
to be sarcastic, I paint the clay with oil paint.

. from Canadian Craftsmen's Association
Special Bulletin

EXCISE TAX
The Federal Government has encouraged us to pursue the matter of

alleviation of Excise Tax for craftsmen and artists. The matter now
binges upon a suitable definition of the product which will be