A man in the moon prays for protection of the Earth. A bear gets too greedy and damages salmon fish spawning grounds, ruining the salmon fishing in the river. People of all races from all around the world who contribute to climate change. This is the story this Lummi Nation totem pole tells. Here in the Pacific Northwest where the Lummi Nation is located, Native Americans are on the front lines fighting new fossil fuel infrastructure, and working to save the Salish Sea, fishing grounds the Lummi and many other tribes have relied upon for millennia.
The pole joins an exhibit about the Anthropocene, and then will go on a nationwide tour to bring attention to fossil fuel infrastructure that threatens the environment.
Update December 2018: The exhibit is now at the Florida Museum of Natural History in Gainseville. An article in the Pacific Standard describes the exhibit:
The focus of Whale People’s curators isn’t on the past, it’s the future—specifically, the future of killer whales off the coast of Washington State and British Columbia, which are threatened by resource extraction. The project is meant to draw attention to the orca population of the Salish Sea, part of the Lummi’s ancestral homeland. Already afflicted by industrial pollution and commercial fishing, the Salish Sea is now threatened by construction of the proposed Trans Mountain Pipeline, which would transfer crude oil from Alberta to British Columbia for export, bringing hundreds of massive oil tankers to the waterway.
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