Haida Modern (2020)

This morning I heard fellow Point Grey High School graduate Robert Davidson on CBC speaking (Haida) culture to (Tom) Power in advance of the network's Haida Modern documentary, to air this week. (In 2007 I had the honour of visiting Davidson at his Semiahmoo studio for a Vancouver Magazine piece on his and his brother Reg's controversial Damien Hirst commissions.)

On the topic of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's Haida art tattoo, Davidson reminded listeners that Trudeau did not ask his permission to wear his work on his arm, but also -- and this is something I didn't know -- that the design Trudeau had adapted was co-authored with Davidson's daughter, Sara, for a 1985 benefit. Robert did the outer design, but for whatever reason Sara's interior lines ("inner world") were replaced with a globe -- a gesture Trudeau tried to justify by saying he got the globe, first, when he was 23, and had (Robert) Davidson's Raven applied around it when he was 40.