One hundred years after the Alaska Yukon Pacific Exposition, this exhibit will examine the representation of indigenous peoples at the fair, explain how the fair shaped the history of the Burke Museum, and provide a forum for indigenous voices to reply, challenging us all to consider how we have changed and/or stayed the same after 100 years.

After the fair, the George T. Emmons collection of Tlingit objects that had been exhibited in the Alaska building was purchased for the young Washington State Museum (now the Burke Museum). This collection, combined with the collections assembled for the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893 (the James G. Swan and Myron Eells collections) and the earlier collections of the Young Naturalist Society, are the founding ethnology collections of the Burke Museum.

This exhibit will feature some of the objects that were exhibited at the fair along with the work of contemporary indigenous artists responding to these objects and to the representation of indigenous peoples at the AYP.

You can view the A-Y-P Exposition Community Web site for more information on the content of the 1909 AYP exposition and events related to it being planned for next year.

Call for artists!
A juried Art Exhibit is being planned for:
AYP: Indigenous Voices Reply (working title)
Burke Museum, May 30 – September 7, 2009

Artists are invited to create pieces for submission to a juried art exhibit on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Alaska Yukon Pacific Exposition (AYP) that was held on the University of Washington campus in Seattle in 1909. Artists are challenged to produce works that respond and reply to the way that the indigenous peoples of Washington state, British Columbia and Alaska as well as the Philippine Islands, Siberia, and Labrador were represented in the 1909 world's fair.

Artists will need to submit images of their pieces to the Burke Museum's selection committee by January 31, 2009. Selections will be made in February, and the pieces chosen to be included in the exhibit must be delivered to the Burke Museum by March 31, 2009. Works included will be on loan and insured during the exhibit, and returned to the artists after the close of the exhibit.

Contact:
Robin K. Wright
Curator of Native American Art
Burke Museum
Box 353010
University of Washington
Seattle, WA 98195-3010
Phone: 206-543-5595
e-mail: wright@u.washington.edu

Browse the Burke Museum AYP Collections