Komoyue artist designs medals

Kristen Douglas

Gazette staff

Olympic athletes taking home medals in 2010 will have a unique piece of art created by a first nations artist with local ties.

Corrine Hunt, who was born in Alert Bay and lived on the North Island for 15 years, is the co-designer of the 2010 Winter Olympic medals.

Hunt collaborated with industrial designer Omer Arbel in designing the medals, but it was her motifs that were selected for each medal.

Her inspiration in designing the medals came “from the environment and from the athletes who are going to wear the medals,” said Hunt.

For the Olympic medal, Hunt chose the orca -- first because “killer whale” is the name given to her by her grandmother in Gelatleg’lees and also because the powerful black and white whales are symbolic of the Games and the athletes.

“The orca is a beautiful creature that is strong, but also lives within a community,” said Hunt. “I felt the Olympic Games are a community too. The athletes may be training, but they’re always somehow connected to their community, to their teammates, or to their country.”

The orca is engraved across four panels, in the style of a traditional West Coast first nations bentwood box.

Hunt chose the raven, on a totem rising, for the Paralympic medals to honour her uncle, who is a paraplegic.

“The raven is a creature that is all things and I think Paralympic athletes have that in them,” said Hunt. “They’re sometimes given challenges and they rise above them and the raven does the same.”

Hunt said she also used the raven, with black wings and profile in a three-part composition styled after totem poles, because it is her family crest.

Each medal is unique, a “different piece of a master artwork,” said Hunt.

The Olympic medals are circular in shape while the Paralympic medals are superellipses, or a squared circle.

Both medals have the official name of the Games in French and English on the backs; on the Paralympic medals the words are also written in braille. The Games motto, With Glowing Hearts, is written in white on the medal’s blue and green ribbon.

Hunt, who is also a member of the Raven Gwa’wina clan from the Ts’akis village, has family still residing in Fort Rupert. She submitted a 35-page proposal to co-design the medals.

“It was quite an extensive proposal,” said Hunt, who has been creating art that reflects her first nations Komoyue and Tlingit heritage since 1985. Her works include engraved jewelry and accessories, custom furnishings in carved stainless steel and reclaimed wood and modern totem poles.

+More News Headlines
<Back to Mobile Edition