Butterfly vs. Raven

Ron shared that his inspiration for this piece comes from a Haida story. "As told to me by my grandfather:Show more

In the beginning there was Raven and Butterfly.
They played amongst the stars. They played tag and hide and seek. They played until they got tired of the games. They looked for something else to play with.
They found the Earth.
They went to Rose Spit which is on the northernmost tip of Haida Gwaii. They walked in the sand.
Soon they noticed something squirt water into the sky. They went to investigate and found a clam. They started to play with the clam. Soon they saw a movement in the clam. They saw human forms in the clam. The humans closed the clam to hide from Raven and Butterfly. No matter how hard they tried to open the clam it wouldn’t open.
Raven talked quietly to the humans. Soon the humans opened the clam to see what was talking to them. They got braver and came out of the clam.
Soon butterfly got tired of the humans and flew away.
The humans started to climb all over Raven. Soon Raven got tired of the humans climbing on him. Raven flew away.
There were still some humans on Raven. They started to tickle Raven. Soon Raven shook and some fell off.
Where the Humans landed they started to make villages.

That is how Haida Gwaii was given to the Haida people." ~ Ron Russ