Stepping into the dark, cave-like anteroom of the Eiteljorg Museum’s newest exhibition, Raven and the Box of Daylight, you’re greeted first by iterations of the white Raven, called Yéil in artist Preston Singletary’s native Tlingit. The centerpiece of the room is a translucent, 3-foot-tall totem, its stacked imagery representing a summary of the narrative journey on which you’re about to embark: Raven, the sun, two humans, and a box that repeats the motifs assembled atop it.
This work, eponymously titled Yéil ka Keiwa.aa (Raven and the Box of Daylight), is made of cast crystal. Yet, like almost everything else in the exhibit, its textures, its shapes, and the way it absorbs and throws the light play with the mind and give the impression of something else entirely. It looks like it’s carved from ice, delicately iridescent from one angle, transparent from another, yet so dense you can feel its weight without touching it.
Placards detailing the story of Raven guide you through the subsequent rooms, where walls painted in black and deep jewel tones and stagecraft, including hanging fringe, audio of voices and natural sounds, and light projection of landscapes and figures, physically immerse you in the tale. You almost expect to smell the forest or feel a cold wind blow as you amble past a river made of brilliant blue glass plates beneath a large canoe, fish positioned as if they’re jumping alongside it, or a mobile of dainty branches hanging from the ceiling that, along with the shadows it casts, resembles a tree with its white leaves dangling, so exquisitely thin they look like either feathers or knives.
Throughout, you’ll find objects that obviously convey the mythical, like Héen Alts’ák (Feather Pulled Through Water), a giant feather with a clear bulb at its base containing a bead of color meant to resemble a speck of dirt inside a drop of water. Other objects are replicas of everyday items you’d find in a Tlingit clan house—vessels for carrying and storing food, water, and resources; items used for rituals; even architectural components, like the corner posts of a Tlingit longhouse or the interior screen that would have designated the chief’s quarters.
It all tells the story of Raven infiltrating the human world, orchestrating a scheme to be born to the daughter of a clan chief as a human child, and scouring the chief’s hoard of treasures in search of the box of daylight.
There are numerous versions of this story throughout the Pacific Northwest. The Tlingit have lived in Southeast Alaska for at least 10,000 years, their oral histories and traditions as embedded in the region as creation stories anywhere else in the world. The interpretation shared in the exhibit is a blend of accounts told by five different Tlingit storytellers. “Each of the stories emphasizes different aspects of the same story. Every telling is a unique treasure,” writes guest curator Miranda Shkik Belarde-Lewis.
But Singletary grew up in Seattle, far removed from the culture of his people. He began working with glass in 1981, refining his skills at Pilchuck Glass School. It wasn’t until 1988 that he began a quest to incorporate his cultural heritage into his artwork. This is where his preoccupation with Raven was born. “Because I wasn’t raised around lots of people who could help me understand it, where I started was with the mythologies, the stories that related to the objects, that related to particular designs,” he explains.
His pursuit led him to Tlingit historian, mythologist, and storyteller Walter Porter, who became his friend and mentor, in 2004. Raven’s story was also Porter’s obsession, and for many years he had already been on a mission to bring it to diverse audiences. Writes Belarde-Lewis, “[Porter] encouraged listeners to carefully consider specific story details as evidence of our shared humanity, while still recognizing distinct cultural differences.”
“He had seen my raven with the sun in its beak, and he said, ‘That’s my life’s work,’” says Singletary. “He wanted to share with me his insights to it. From a Joseph Campbell kind of perspective, he was able to identify these archetypes within the story that are universal symbols or metaphors. When he shared those insights with me, it gave me a deeper understanding and feeling that these cultural stories are universal.”
In light of Porter’s mission and of Singletary’s upbringing away from Tlingit land, Singletary brings a sweeping perspective to the story in his use of a contemporary medium—glass—and audiovisual installation methods, as well as in his collaborations with other artists, the artisans and technicians in his workshop, storytellers, and historians, including Haida fashion designer and textile artist Dorothy Grant.
Singletary mentions the far-reaching application of themes such as forgiveness and radical transformation, as when Raven turns from white to black. He discusses one part of the story, the birth of Raven to the chief’s daughter, within the framework of the Immaculate Conception, relaying a time Porter once told him, “I don’t want people to think they can hog Jesus all to themselves.”
The culmination of the story, of course, is that Raven succeeds in securing the box of daylight and unleashing light into the world. As a result, the people of the clan who raised him as a human child scatter in confusion, their dark world now bright. Many of them become the creatures of the sea, air, and land, while some stay human. This is conveyed in 12 busts of human-like forms, some of which represent Tlingit clans, like Kéet Káa (Killer Whale Man), whose shoulders rise a bit taller than the others’ and who represents Singletary’s clan.
One could spend hours scanning the details of each bust, which emerge clearer the longer you look. This is true of every object in Singletary’s body of work. Different angles reveal shifting textures, colors, and light. Viewed from one direction, a surface appears solid, and from another, it’s translucent. Likewise, something may appear one color from one position and a completely different color from another. Objects mimic non-glass materials: marble, clay, stone, bone, animal hide, wood, resin, mother-of-pearl, obsidian. Some take on a metallic patina. Some glow with the light projected onto them, some glow with an artificial light contained within, and some glow with what seems to be a light all their own. Shapes that appear familiar take surprising turns. Symbols that appear to repeat take on subtle differences. What appears symmetrical is, in fact, not.
Singletary is a master of manipulating perspective and perception—all in keeping with his presentation of this distinct cultural property, the story of Raven, as something anyone can glean meaning and wisdom from. “There are all kinds of teachings within these stories,” he says. “These stories are so important because they talk about the origins of us as human beings and how we started to make sense of the world. These metaphors can be broadly interpreted and cross-referenced to other modes of theology, mythology.”
It’s impossible not to pick a favorite as you peruse the striking busts that close the exhibit, to gravitate to one with which you identify the most—completing the circle, bringing it all home, inserting yourself into the story. And in exploring the treasures of his heritage and unleashing them into the world, that must make Singletary the Raven.
Raven and the Box of Daylight will be on display at the Eiteljorg Museum through March 9, 2025. The Eiteljorg will host public programming highlighting the works in the exhibit, including a glass-blowing workshop, on Saturday, December 7; click for details.
