Birch Bark Biting Fundamentals -- Art of Angelique Merasty Levac

Angelique Merasty Levac has been an ambassador for the Woodland Cree nation through her expertise as a birch bark biting artist from Northern Manitoba. She is prolific at producing the art from birch bark.

“I go home once a year and search for my birch bark in Manitoba. It takes me about three to four days to find the bark, free of knot, white birch, with few branches.

"I have to search for the straight tree and when I find it usually the first layer is weather damaged, and that’s no good, and sometimes the second layer is too. You use the third, fourth, and sometimes fifth layer if you’re lucky,” explains Angelique.

“I don’t cut the trees, don’t want damage the tree. I go and sample and cut it a bit and test it, since sometimes they look good but aren’t. What I do is, I try to get most of it from one tree, far as I can reach. Now I cut the layers up, and peel it a bit, cut into squares, and do it again by finding another tree, in Manitoba, mostly Pukatawagan area,” north of Lynn Lake, Manitoba.

“I bring the birch bark home and have to rest and get into a my own little world, when I am doing this birch bark biting. I store the pieces. I have to be thinking clearly, then I will bring out the birch bark, and it has to be peeled into strips. Sometimes peeling the bark causes a lot of ripping. At all times I am aiming for a large piece but this is not often possible, due to ripping the bark as I am peeling it.”

Angelque says, “I will fold the piece into a small square by folding it again, but instead of doing a cut-out, what I do is make a tooth impression, bite a design, for example, a hummingbird, and I picture his wings and his body, and I start to bite at his beak, and then his head and the wings and the body, and that’s how I picture it in my head.

“By biting, what I should say is you cannot bite too hard or you puncture a hole through the bark. You have to bite hard enough to produce a bruise with your teeth but if you bite too hard the pressure will destroy the bark. It’s a matter of pressure, also to create the image and the contrast in the image by bruising the bark.

"I use the teeth on each side, with the sharpest tooth, and however I feel comfortable, and it depends on the design, and that is how I bruise the birch bark which makes the designs come out.”

It is intricate work, “And when I finish I open it by unfolding, once, for I cannot refold the bark, it will not line up properly twice. All my designs have to be done exactly in one effort with each part, flowers, wings, eyes, other parts to a piece, complete in my head, until it’s finished.

"When it is finished I leave quarter or half inch on each side so it can be framed. It has to be framed with acid free matting, and the birch bark cannot be left long on paper that is not acid-free.”

This art is becoming rare, “Everybody’s teeth marks are different, and I didn’t learn this overnight. I started in 1980, and I have had a lot of practice, and I owe my teacher, Angelique Merasty. She said, ‘Whatever I taught you here you cannot learn overnight. You have to go home and practice,' and I went home and did that.’”

Regarding the medium in which she works, “If you store it properly birch bark has an endless shelf life, but it’s getting harder to find. I think the good bark is going fast, and when I am travelling, I watch the forest and I wonder if the ozone or the environment is affecting the tops of the trees, the branches at the crown at the top of the trees are dying, and breaking off.

"When I am travelling I am looking at the birch bark and what I see is all the trees are damaged on the top, in all provinces. I am not looking for prospective trees, just looking at birch bark. Nevertheless I continue to work at my art and currently I have orders from Toronto, among other places, and I still produce lots of the the art every year.”

Angelique’s book, God Opens Doors (Kisemanitow Peyohtena Iskwatem) came out from a Winnipeg-based, Canada-USA publisher, summer of 2012.

Freelance Writing by Mack McColl 

Housing a not-forgotten issue in Manitoba

Darcy Wood is engaged in policy-making of housing at Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs, “We develop housing and infrastructure policies related to First Nation housing and infrastructure. Our programs and policies relate to the ability to meet the needs in communities, and policies arise from the demographics. Our strategy is based on scenarios that include 18 people to a house in communities like Pukatawagon, where people take shifts sleeping.”

Urgency is an understatement with population growing at 2.5 percent per month. “We identified the number of houses on reserve as of May 2011. We found Manitoba has average housing density at 2.5 per household, whereas First Nations averaged 5.7 per household, almost triple the density.” Wood says, “We need 30,000 houses. We also identified the number of adequate houses, and the number of houses with repairs required.”

Wood said, “Major renovations are required and we identified a cost of about $40,000 per unit in repairs, in addition to minor repairs. We have 1,300 condemned units still occupied. The housing backlog has been identified.” Housing costs present AMC with daunting figures, “It costs $150,000 per house to build, and there will be additional costs of $25,000, depending on location,” says Wood. 

“We identified $2.7 billion required for First Nation housing in Manitoba alone.” Wood says, “No government’s gonna do that,” candidly. Indeed, says Wood, “We receive an average of about $22 million per year for housing (or $30 million in a good year), and 80 percent goes to building supplies.”

In a bid to maximize the impact of the money, Nelson House Cree Nation formed Meetah Building Supplies about ten years ago within Nelson House Development Corporation, David Kobliski, general manager. “We are very humble operation, Kobliski says. “Gert Wilzer runs a bulk building purchase program for supplies, and Bands can save 30 percent in the purchase price of building materials and supplies. We opened a Meetah franchise in Onion Lake, Saskatchewan, two years ago.”

Kobliski says, “We structured ourselves to purchase directly though a buying group. Bands buy at reduced cost and Meetah supplies training to on-reserve labour, building the social capital of the First Nations by creating skilled labour. Previous suppliers would come in, drop off materials, and leave, so this is an improved use of the funding .”

Thus, “We purchase direct and pay less and have money to operate the lumber yard, employ community members. We have big populations to serve, and we manufacture doors and cabinets in Nelson House,” more employed skill labour, creating social capital that is needed in capacity building.

Twelve people are employed in manufacturing at Meetah. “We are currently discussion with other First Nations to offer the same opportunities as we have, and the primary benefit is the transfer of knowledge and creation of skills, making employment opportunities in building houses. We have Red Seal apprenticeship carpenter training at the Nelson House facility graduating a few apprentices every year.

“NCN Builders at Nelson House is a Band-owned company that constructs houses. We offer two packages, one is a house with materials , the other is a supplied and constructed house, so one package is supplying the building materials and one is supplying labour with the materials.” They build on reserve housing, an average of 15 units per year. 

“Project development is portable and the other thing we do is build houses for the real estate market in Thompson, Manitoba, design, build, and sell them. The company is doing commercial building, as examples, a restaurant and personal care home in Nelson House.”

The Nelson House company employs 15 full time employees. Onion Lake’s Meetah Building Supplies run their own operations ranging all over Saskatchewan from Onion Lake. “We have non-competition agreements,” said Kobliski, “and strategies in the sales are based on that arrangement.”

Churchill port open July to November on Hudson's Bay

Churchill Visitors Bureau

 

The Port of Churchill is situated on the western shore of Hudson's Bay, in Northern Manitoba. It is open four months of the year from July until November, says Bill Drew, Executive Director of the Churchill Gateway Development Corporation, who noted that the 2009 shipping season is shaping up to be a good one. Making the tonnage grow at the port has always been a challenge, however, the port is constantly working to attract interest from world shipping circles. The distances between continents are shorter at the top of the world but the opportunity to sail these shorter distances between Northern Europe and Russia and Canada is restricted by Arctic ice.

"Churchill Gateway Development Corporation (CGDC) was established in June 2003 for the purpose of marketing the Port of Churchill through diversifying the traffic base and building two-way traffic," says the website. Drew says, "OmniTrax Inc. headquartered in Denver, CO operates the port facilities and the railroad from Churchill to The Pas." Drew is pleased to note that 75 percent of the people who work for the Port of Churchill and Hudson's Bay Railway Company are local and Aboriginal.

There are a wide array of jobs available at the port as well as in the town of Churchill (www.portofchurchill.ca) and on the rail line that transfers cargo along a southeastern span 800 kilometres, from the centre of the western coast of Hudson's Bay to The Pas, Manitoba. From there cargo moves to points in Canada, USA, and Mexico. The port was developed in 1928 after a long mercantile and industrial age history that began in 1686 as a Hudson's Bay Company fort when a semi-permanent post was established a few kilometres from the mouth of the Churchill River.

By 1717 HBC men in York Factory and present day Churchill were actively trading furs sought from Rupert's Land and there was a whaling industry working to serve the British Empire with lamp oil and medicinal unguents. HBC eventually constructed a formidable fort called Prince of Wales Fort to defend their interests against French warships and this stands today as a national historic site in Churchill.  Today vessels come to Churchill from July to November via Hudson Strait passing Iceland and Greenland and Baffin Island to pick up grain as well as bring fertilizer from Russia. One recent operation in cargo saw fertilizer coming from Estonia.

On average, the port exports 500,000 tonnes of grain per year. People who live and work in this distant Arctic home come from the town or other communities in Nunavut and Manitoba's vast north. Drew says, "People really enjoy living here,'" which doesn't surprise Drew because most of the people are locals from Dene, Cree and Inuit heritage, "It's a bit of a melting pot of northern cultures." The mayor of the town Mike Spence is Aboriginal and Mike sits on the Board of Directors of the Port Of Churchill Gateway Corporation.

Drew says the Aboriginal component has been integral to the development of the Port of Churchill, "The port is unionized with members of the grain handlers union, PSAC, and ILWU locals. We have a Canadian Customs office and the employees rotate on a monthly basis when the port is operational."  The sailing season of today, says Drew, may change in years to come with the onset of later seasons and early break-ups of ice on the Hudson's Bay. That change is yet to come, and nor is it a desirable occurrence, he says. The town has another distinction, "the situation with polar bears," is pretty straight forward, "there's a lot of Them."

Aboriginal employees the core at Churchill port

The Port of Churchill is situated on the western shore of Hudson's Bay, in Northern Manitoba. It is open four months of the year from July until November, says Bill Drew, Executive Director of the Churchill Gateway Development Corporation, "It's not going too bad at all." Making the tonnage grow at the port has always been a challenge, however, the port authorities are constantly working to attract interest from world shipping circles. The distance between continents are shorter at the top of the world but the opportunity to sail these shorter distances between Northern Europe and Russia and Canada is restricted by Arctic ice; cost efficiencies remain in shipping cargo this way by meeting a railhead sooner (because it's cheaper to ship cargo by rail).
    

"Churchill Gateway Development Corporation (CGDC) was established in June 2003 for the purpose of marketing the Port of Churchill through diversifying the traffic base and building two-way traffic," says the website. Drew says, "We operate port facilities and have an interest in a public/private railroad from Churchill to The Pas." Drew notes that 75 percent of the people who work for Port of Churchill and Hudson's Bay Railway Company (partly owned by Omnitrax of USA and the port) are local and Aboriginal.
    

These jobs are found at the wide array port facilities in the town of Churchill (www.portofchurchill.ca) and on the rail line that transfers cargo along a southeastern span 800 kilometres, from the centre of the western coast of Hudson's Bay to The Pas, Manitoba. From there cargo moves to points in Canada, USA, and Mexico. The port was developed in 1928 after a long mercantile and industrial age history that began in 1686 as a Hudson's Bay Company fort when a semi-permanent post was established a few kilometres from the mouth of the Churchill River.
     

By 1717 HBC men in York Factory near present-day Churchill were actively trading furs sought from Rupert's Land and there was a whaling industry working to serve the British Empire with lamp oil and medicinal unguents. HBC eventually constructed a formidable fort called Prince of Wales Fort to defend their interests against French warships and this stands today as a national historic site in Churchill.  

Today vessels come to Churchill from July to November via Hudson Strait passing Iceland and Greenland and Baffin Island to bring fertilizer from Russia. One recent operation in cargo sees phosphate fertilizer come from Estonia and Murmansk.
    

The port handles the export of 50,000 tonnes of grain per year. People who live and work in this distant Arctic home come from the town or other communities in Nunavut and Manitoba's vast north. Drew says, "Whenever I ask these people if they like living here, they reply, 'Yes, I want to live here,'" which doesn't surprise Bill because most of the people are locals from Dene, Cree and Inuit heritage, "It's a bit of a melting pot of northern cultures." The mayor of the town Mike Spence is Aboriginal and Mike sits on the Board of Directors of the Port Of Churchill Gateway Corporation.
    

Drew says the Aboriginal component has been integral to the development of the Port of Churchill, "They are tied to the unions as part of the grainhandlers union, PSAC, and ILWU locals. We have a Canadian Customs office and the employees at the international port offices rotate on a monthly basis when the port is operational."  The sailing season of today, says Drew, may change in years to come with the onset of later seasons and early break-ups of ice on the Hudson's Bay. That change is yet to come, and nor is it a desirable occurrence, he says. The town has another distinction, "the situation with polar bears," is pretty straight forward, "there's a lot of them."

Birch Bark Biting preserved by coincidental names

"I was born at Midnight Lake, Manitoba," explained Angelique Merasty Levac, about the far northern reaches of central Canada. "It is bush and nobody lives there. Once in a while a few of my siblings or family members traps there." Angie holds close memories of a distant place spent with her grandparents in the decades of the 1950s and 1960s. It was a Cree people’s playground and belonged to no one else.

Angelique Merasty Levac

"I lived beside a nice lake," and enjoyed the company of loons going 'co-co-op' in the morning hours. Angie recollects, "My grandparents tried to teach me how to trap when I was six years old." It was a tiny squirrel trap set under a bundle of roots at the base of a tree near the lakeside, not far from the family dwelling, a large canvas tent.

Her grandmother, she recalls, provided explicit instructions about the patience of trapping, leaving the site alone to permit the process to take its course. Little Angie waited till grandparents went to sleep and approached her fledgling trap line to see if she was enriched.

She stuck her six year old hand into the squirrel-sized cubby hole and trapped herself, snap. Ouch. So she hollered with an affinity for the squirrel that wasn't there and recalls a painful few minutes by inspecting her long, feminine fingers on both hands. It was the end of Angelique Merasty Levac's life as a trapper and a few families of bushy tailed squirrels have reason to chatter in gratitude.

Those years in the lakes district straddling the Manitoba-Saskatchewan border were similar to a nomadic way because Angie’s grandpa found it necessary to break camp and find a different place every few weeks. He was a trapper, "My grandpa never lived in one place," and packed the large tent and barrel stove to set off looking to camp at the right spot. It was a lean existence.

"I used to help my grandmother gather branches she used to make a floor inside the tent," and, "there was nothing to play with when I was a child. Do you know what my toy was?" She told her grandmother she wanted a doll. “We had a flour sack and she tied up the bag into a rag doll, eyes made from the soot of the fire; that was my doll.”

At nine years of age Angie began to spend more time with her mother and less time with her grandparents, because she would be more help to her mother raising 12 children on the Lynn Lake railroad line in northern Manitoba. She went out with ladies on berry picking sojourns, blue berries found in burned out areas, cranberries found in forested places.

It was the cranberry picking trips where she saw the women take a rest and conduct little competitions. They would peel birch bark and make pieces of art with their teeth but Angie was too young to think much about it. It was a first impression of the way the ladies made social exchanges while causing artistic impressions by birch bark biting that she adopted as a fast disappearing cultural practice.

Angelique Merasty Levac has become a Cree cultural icon and reigning queen of a disappearing form of First Nation culture. Over the past three decades Angie has garnered a lot of attention for the artistic skill at birch bark biting. She has beautiful straight teeth with which to take on the task of an ancient artistic craft.

In an oddly important coincidence her teacher of the art was also named Angelique Merasty. The elder Angelique Merasty has passed away and almost miraculously passed the legacy to Angelique Merasty Levac under the most difficult conditions imaginable.

The reason the younger Angelique was found to return to the art form is partly owed to bingo, for the mentor Angelique Merasty was one day sitting waiting for a ride to bingo and was, miraculously, in the company of an anthropologist while she waited. To pass the time she reached over and peeled a piece of birch bark off a log and bit into it until the art was born. The taxi arrived and she cheerfully left it to the professor, who promptly sent it to an archivist and writer.

Soon an article appeared detailing the art and the artist, who had been interviewed and expressed a wish to pass the craft onto someone before it was forgotten. Angelique the student saw the magazine article when she was 24 years of age. It is important to realize where our Angie grew up. She did not speak English until she was about 12 to 15 years of age, and only spoke Cree. (This was prior to Bill C-31 and she had no access to school for her mother had been stripped of her status by her marriage to a Metis man.)

Our Angie did not read English until she taught herself by reading the Holy Bible. By the time she was 24 she was able to read and stood amazed to see her name described in  a magazine at a store. She stared at the magazine story about Angelique Merasty, not herself, but her name, who was a practitioner of an ancient art form, a Cree culture artform, and this same Angelique Merasty described in the article how she, "would like to pass this Native art form onto another."

Our Angie had those recollections of the ladies in the berry patches taking a respite to bite into the birch bark and she decided thereabouts that the passing ought to be to herself.

She credits her worship of God, "The Lord put that in my heart. Since I did it, it opened doors that I never dreamed of," including a visit to Bill Cosby in Philadelphia, USA, with a guest appearance on his remake of the TV classic 'You Bet Your Life.' She was interviewed by Keith Morrison on CTV, and appeared on BCTV, APTN, the Knowledge Network, and in numerous print articles, including this one in the nationwide Native Journal. (For more information about Angelique’s art email her at angeliquesnativearts@yahoo.ca)