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Extended Project – Frank Higson

Title: How to make a Native-American style Totem Pole

Model totem. Maquette.

I will split my project into three core areas:
1. Wood types best used for woodcarving
2. Tools best used for woodcarving
3. Design – what does a totem pole consist of?

I will aim to use a variety of different sources, namely, museums, books and the internet, as well as interviews. I will then create a totem pole, based on my research behind what a totem pole is.

What do totem poles consist of?

Totem poles have a variety of different purposes, although they are never used as figures to worship, or depictions of ‘gods’. The primary and most common use for a North American West Coast (the area totem poles originated) totem pole was to tell a story. Although the totem poles may be difficult to interpret as a story in this day and age, when they were carved they most likely helped depict a story that was as well known to them as say, Little Red Riding Hood is to us. So if I tell a story, I may want to tell a story that is fairly well known.
However, Totem Poles are about identity as well. Many original totem pole designs use animals; however, the carvers and creators lived in the same environments as the animals. Hence, as Wayne Hill and James McKee suggest in ‘Carve your own Totem Pole’, we’re hardly going to have any family stories that begin, “One day, when your father was out spearing fish, a whale surfaced beside the boat”. Many modern day totem poles can include not animals but familiar objects, such as skis or golf clubs. I may want to consider this when creating my totem pole: I don’t have many close encounters with grizzly bears or coyote’s, although I might see squirrels, pidgeons, or cups of tea (although these are far less exciting encounters, which don’t produce many exciting stories). This is something to take into consideration when designing my totem pole; traditionally styled or contemporarily styled?
Another alternative and slightly more rare use of a totem pole is to use it as a ‘shame pole’. These are used to ridicule another person or party who the carver believes owes an unpaid debt. They could tell a shameful story or depict the person in a negative way. So I could carve my pole to shame a person or a group, for example, responsible for a major world catastrophe such as the pole created in Alaska that depicts the ex-CEO of the company Exxon distorted, representing the unpaid debt he owes to the environment for taking part in causing a large oil spill. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Totem_pole).

According to Carve your own Totem Pole, a full sized totem pole would take a team of 20 experienced wood carvers up to a year to create, with the tools costing a minimum of £300. I don’t have the time, experience or money to create a full size totem pole, so I will want to think of ways of altering my original idea to make it possible for me to create.

Ways I can alter my project:
- Size is an issue. If I use a far smaller piece of wood, then the tools are far less expensive, and I will have the time to carve the pole. So I could either design the full totem pole, and only carve the bottom image, or downsize the entire pole, and carve the full design. I think the latter idea would be my preference, as it would result in my original idea – I would have the end product of a totem pole, while if I went with the first idea I wouldn’t – I would have a carved face. Furthermore, the first idea would mean I would still need to obtain the tools that I would have to obtain for a real totem pole, while if I use a small bit of wood, I can use smaller, more common tools.
- Experience is an issue. Having never attempted wood carving previously, I will probably work very slowly. So I may want to use a very soft wood to carve my pole. As I don’t know about soft woods, I will want to organise an interview to find out about wood.


It is easy to notice when observing numerous totem poles, that they appear to be numerous images ascending one upon another. There is an importance order involved, however it is not that the most important images are at the top with the least important at the bottom – it is the other way round. And this is simply because of common sense and practicality-the images at the bottom are more intricate simply because more people will see them than the ones 20 feet in the sky. But as I will be carving a small totem pole, this is not a relevant issue. An alternative is having a chronology, almost showing a narrative to a story through pictures, either ascending or descending. A common theme to a totem pole showing a story is the theme of transformation: so if I was to use common themes I may want to show an element of transformation in my totem pole.

So the questions I will want to answer before I start the design of my totem pole are:
Do I tell a story?
If so, a story about my identity/life, or a well known story?
Traditionally styled or contemporarily styled?
Do I show a theme of transformation?
Shame pole or totem pole?

To help decide what your pole consists of a method suggested in ‘Carve your own Totem Pole’ is to look for thematic connections. To do this, they suggest drawing a number of different circles on a piece of paper, each holding a different element I want to include, and draw lines between each one to show the links. I tried this method but it gave uninteresting results, as in my interests did not seem like interests that would translate effectively onto a totem pole. However, after thinking about my interests, it gave me some inspiration. On the piece of paper I had ‘Greek myths’ circled. I began thinking about telling a story of a Greek myth, in particular ‘The Labours of Heracles’, a myth more familiar to me than most. So this would be a great way of intertwining two very different cultures. It would still be traditional: it would tell the story of Heracles, which could also be said to be a story of transformation, (he completes the labours to be granted immortality, hence becoming like his father, and a wife, hence becoming a completed man). It is also a fairly well known story, one that some people might recognise even as a totem pole. It also would mean the totem pole would be much less mundane, because of all the exciting creatures he meets in the stories. It is also quite a structured story; he does one task, then another, then another, so structurally, it would fit very well on a totem pole.
So in many ways, it is still a traditionally styled totem pole. I will need to research each ‘task’ to gain inspiration for each tasks interpretation upon the pole, although it is open to my own west coast style interpretation, as I want to carve the pole in the same style as that of the original west coast totem poles.

According to the New Larousse Encyclopedia of Mythology Heracles’ function was to be the personification of physical strength. So as the totem pole’s function is to tell the story of Heracles, I want it to show somehow his primary aspect of strength. I could do this by making the images upon the totem pole look fearsome and dangerous, showing the hardship and courage (and therefore strength) that Heracles shows to complete his labours.

The 12 labours are:
Slay the Nemean lion. Impenetrable skin, strangled to death.
Slay the 9-headed Lernaean Hydra. Poisonous breath, nine heads, lives in a swamp, one head cannot die, serpent.
Capture the Golden Hind of Artemis. Golden antlers. Chased for a full year.
Capture the Erymanthian Boar. Terrifying, came from a mountain.
Clean the Augean stables in a single day. Dammed a river so that it flowed through the stables.
Slay the Stymphalian Birds. Man eating, with wings and beaks of iron. Blocked out the sun when in flight.
Capture the Cretan Bull. Driven mad by Poseidon.
Steal the Mares of Diomedes. Man eating horses owned by the son of Ares.
Obtain the Girdle of the Amazon Queen.
Obtain the Cattle of the Monster Geryon – a triple bodied monster, and had a great deal of trouble getting them back, especially when Hera sent a gadfly which drove them bad and they scattered over a mountain range.
Steal the Apples of the Hesperides. Slayed the dragon garding the garden, and tricked Atlas, who held up the world, into obtaining the apples for him.
Capture and bring back Cerberus – a three headed dog which luckily for Heracles shared one throat, which he choaked. Cerberus was guardian of the infernal gates.

Now I know what images my totem pole will consist of, I need to know how to present these images in West Coast style. After examining many pictures from ‘Carve your own Totem Pole’ and Native-American art in the British museum, I have a few ideas in my head. Furthermore, ‘Carve your own Totem Pole’ explains that when designing a totem pole, there are five basic shapes that make up most of the design. ‘By varying them and combining them in different ways, carvers can create all kinds of figures’. These shapes are known as: circle, U form, S form, ovoid, split U and trigon, which is split U inversed.
(These can be seen in my notebook). I then used these shapes to design each labour, in rough. I found some designs more effective than others: in particular, I found that the horse did not look effective as I found it difficult to visualise. The ‘carve your own totem pole’ book heavily influenced the designs; without previous experience, I had to gain inspiration from the book as I didn’t know how to design my own designs. So, for example, the boar comes from a picture of an existing pole showing a beaver, only the teeth have been changed. So I designed the influenced ones first: however, there were no designs that looked like a lion. So I did design this one myself, using the 5 basic shapes (the mouth is a trigon, the eyes and nose ovals). The design for the man eating bird is heavily influenced by a wood carving from the native American section. Although independent of a totem pole, I could attach a similar carving to the top of my pole.

I turned the rough designs into a final design on graphed paper. When I did this, I made altercations from my original rough sketches: I removed lots of the detail, as I realised that, as I was doing a smaller totem pole, the detail might be too difficult to carve.
Now, I need to get the materials so I can begin carving. I will conduct an interview to do so.

Planning my first interview: what do I need to find out? I need to find out primarily about what wood would be quickest to carve when carving a small totem pole. So I found someone who knew more than most about carving on a small scale: Mayall, who is the production manager at the Globe Theater, and had been a set designer for many years. I asked him about the best wood for small scale wood carving, and he told me that he used balsa wood, a very malleable lightwood, to design his sets on a small scale. He told me it was easy and quick to carve. A small selection of knives would be enough to carve a whole totem pole, if I was to use balsa wood. So I went to a shop called 4D, to get the block of wood. There was a perfect sized wood for my totem pole, which cost £20.

The photo diary shows the process of constructing the totem pole.

The end product does not look like the final design. There are reasons behind this. Working from top to bottom: Geryon’s nostrils have been changed from the spiral design to a simple circle. I couldn’t visualise the spirals on the pole itself – I found it hard to imagine how they would look when carved.
There are only 7 hydra snakes instead of 9. 3 on each side simply couldn’t fit and simultaneously keep the snake shape. So I had to downsize to 7, although as Greek mythology and native American art is down to personal interpretation, I didn’t think that it ruined the totem pole.
The boar has lost its eyebrows. One of the problems is that I didn’t remove enough detail when changing my rough design into a final design. I overestimated my skills as a wood carver, so when carving the final design, I lost quite a large amount of detail. Because of this, however, I decided to paint my totem pole, as I could regain the detail lost in the carving process. This was particularly important for the Amazonian belt. Because the trigon shapes were so small, they were very difficult to carve and because chipped and undetailed, so it was important I felt to add paint to regain the detail.
I decided I wanted to paint the totem pole for another reason as well: although the lion looked like a lion in design, after it was carved it looked very strange, as though the face was independent from the pole. Painting, if coordinated across the pole, could help tie the lion together with the other designs.
The river maybe changed the most: the s-forms were far too hard to carve, so I decided painting them on would be necessary if I wanted to show the river in the final design.
The other two designs surprisingly didn’t change from the original design, although I felt it wasn’t clear that the ovoid shape carved into Atlas’s left hand was supposed to be an apple, so painting it would help to clarify what it represented. So now I had another job to do: paint the totem pole.