Portrait figure

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Haida woman represented in this carved figure wears a pleated cotton dress and holds what appears to be a wafer. In the mid-nineteenth century, Haida men and women made regular journeys to Victoria, British Columbia, five hundred miles south of their homeland on Haida Gwaii, also known as the Queen Charlotte Islands. The woman likely acquired her garment there, and the wafer may refer to the Christian Eucharist, perhaps symbolizing her religious conversion.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art