Hi my name is Amber Lincoln. I'm a curator here at the British Museum in the Americas
section. And I'm currently working on an exhibition about the Arctic; The Circumpolar North. Welcome
to my corner
It's a real honour for me to stand in front of this parka. This is a Yupik parka from
Western Alaska from a village called Kipnuk. This parka was made by Luisa Kunuk from Kipnuk.
She passed away in 1973 but her son kept her parka that she had made and eventually sold
it to Jonathan King who in in 1990s was working at the British Museum as a curator. And he
travelled to Bethel Alaska and purchased this parka from her grandson John Kunuk. Since
that time it's been here at the museum. It's been on display a number of times. It really
is kind of a masterpiece and we're so honoured to have it in the collection. And I'm really
pleased to sort of share some of the the knowledge about Yupik parkas that I've learned from
various seamstresses in Alaska; Elena Charles and other Inupiat seamstresses. Faye Ongtowasruk,
Esther Norton and Lela Oman. They shared a lot of knowledge with me about the ways of
making these kinds of parkas what they mean and and how they were worn. So I'm going to
tell you a little bit about that. These parkas are referred to as fancy parkas. They are
worn with a lot of pride. This is your Sunday best. This is what you wear to different seasonal
celebrations, for instance the big fur rundy in Alaska. There are a number of events of
dancing Yupik and Anupiak dancing so people wear their fanciest clothes to that. I should
first tell you a little bit about why these things are worn with such pride. There's a
number of reasons, but if we look at the materials that this parka is made from; We start here
this is a ruff. You start at the top the hood this is really what defines parkas is these
big hoods. This hood in particular is called a sunshine ruff. So when this is pulled out
it reminds people of a sunshine. It's made with different kinds of fur. On the inner
side the fur that's worn against your skin, is Wolverine. And people often wear Wolverine
on their ruffs because Wolverine for for various reasons doesn't collect moisture so it's next
to your face. You're breathing, exhaling hot air which would collect along the furs and
it doesn't freeze. If it did freeze that would be icicles slashing against your face, and
be very uncomfortable. Now the second fur here is Wolf fur. And wolf fur is much longer.
And in the deep cold when it's very windy when it's very cold you know 40 below the
the ruffs fold out. This long fur from the wolf gets pointed out creating this really
wonderful microclimate right around the face. Your face is perfectly protected and you it
even kind of protects you from that howling wind it's, you're in your nice little quiet
bubble. So they're really beautiful and they're really comfortable to wear when it's, when
it's cold and windy. The main body part is made out of ground squirrel. And ground squirrels
are these small animals that are all over Alaska. They live everywhere but they are
small. And it's basically just the back section that is used for these parkas. So you can
imagine how many different ground squirrels this parka is made from. Esther Norton told
me that when she made these parkas it usually took her a hundred or so of these ground squirrel
hides. These parkas take an incredible amount of work as you can imagine they're sewn by
hand and so if you look on the inside,
you can see how even these stitches are. And it was important that these seamstresses took
their time, were really deliberate. Because if you sewed a hunter for instance a parka
that fell apart, didn't work, got holes, you could seriously jeopardize that person's life.
People forget that one of the most important tools for living in the Arctic is actually
the needle. Because if you don't have the ability to be warm and mobile, right. You
could just stay in your house, but then of course you can't get out to get food. So if
you can't be mobile and warm, you're not going to make it. There's also these beautiful tassels
and these are made from Ermine. The trim historically was often made with reindeer hide and again
in Alaska there were caribou, basically wild reindeer. Caribou are pretty much one colour.
Kind of a beigey colour, but reindeers are much more diverse in colour. And so when the
Alaska native seamstresses got hold of reindeer it was a big deal. And they would trade, often
in the Russia far east and with reindeer herders from Chukotka. If they could get a white reindeer
that was really important around the early 20th century. But very soon after that, traders
and commercial companies came in. People could order calf skin and then this is calf. If
we go down further the trim here is beaver. And beaver is you know a wonderful fur that
has these outer guard hairs. So if you think about how many different furs are in this
one coat. For them part of the pride comes from the fact that they were able to get so
many furs. These beautiful diverse furs. And it really means that either the furs were
provided by their family, or husbands or fathers or sons. And it really shows how successful
and what good hunters they were. And that's really important for people. So wearing a
garment like this sort of shows the success of one's family. Hunters definitely are important
and and still are highly revered, but at the same time so are seamstresses. Both work together
right. So one brings in the material, one processes that material and then gives it
back. These incredible works of art are aesthetically beautiful and they have this huge history
of stories and family connections and family pride. But at the end of the day, they're
incredibly functional. And that's also one of their beauties. To put so much effort into
something that is so necessary. So thank you all for watching it's been great to chat about
this wonderful object and shout out to my friends and colleagues across the Arctic.
If you want to experience the Arctic here in London check out this page.