Timeline (2001 - ongoing)

Native Americans have lived in Maine for thousands of years. Their story begins today and extends back, some say, to time immemorial. Much of their history is based on oral tradition.

Wabanaki oral tradition includes origin stories that tell how the People and the world came to be; it also includes stories, tales, and songs that define society and tell people how they should live. In the past, Native people used oral tradition, rather than the written word, to pass on traditional knowledge. Many of the stories were retold and written down in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Today, these transcripts provide a rich resource for Wabanaki storytellers to recreate and teach about traditional culture. Programs to perpetuate and rekindle Wabanaki languages rely on the power of traditional stories for teaching material. The stories build bridges between the past and present and provide a mechanism for cultural continuity.

Click on the corresponding links below to visit that specific section of the Timeline.

A New Dawn (Present - 1950) 

Hard Times – The Survival of the People (1950 - 1800)

Resistance – Making War & Negotiating Peace (1796 - 1675) 

Strangers in the Land – European Contact (1675 - 1500) 

Time of Dawn (500 - 12,000 years ago)

Transcending Traditions (traveling)

Transcending Traditions featured five contemporary Maine Indian basketmakers representing the next generation: Jeremy Frey, Ganessa (Bryant) Frey, Sarah Sockbeson, Geo Neptune, and Eric “Otter” Bacon. This project explored the new directions that these innovative artists are taking the tradition in the face of environmental and economic challenges.

This exhibit was created as a collaboration between the Maine Indian Basketmakers Alliance and the Hudson Museum, supported by a grant from the National Museum of the American Indian's Indigenous Contemporary Arts Program.

Learn More: Hudson Museum Online Exhibit

Twisted Path

Throughout North America, Native people balance the importance of tribal identity and knowledge with the non-Native communities that surround them. Art serves as one means of survival, expressing a wide range of emotions and experiences, from hopes and fears for the future, to dreams and anger about the past. Breaking away from stereotypes of Native American art and what is considered "traditional," the work of contemporary Native artists proves that art and culture are not static, but constantly evolving.

Borrowed from traditional beadworking, the term "twisted path" is a pattern that meanders along the edge of an object. Here, it is a metaphor for the different paths Native American artists walk as they navigate a complex world. The Twisted Path series was conceived in 2008 by Rick Hunt, Abenaki. This series focuses on creating Maine-based conversations like those taking place nationally about contemporary issues, as expressed through Native art. The Native artists who are invited to participate in Twisted Path are well-known for their artistic talent, activism, and critical commentary regarding social issues related to sovereignty and the environment.  

Twisted Path: Contemporary Native American Artists Walking in Two Worlds opened in 2009 and featured nationally and regionally renowned artists whose works expressed the complexities surrounding Native identity.   

Twisted Path II: Contemporary Native American Art Informed by Tradition opened in October 2011 through May 2012 and invited regional artists to consider how traditional materials, styles, and art forms can be a foundation for new works of art, challenging assumptions of what constitutes “traditional.”  

Twisted Path III: Questions of Balance opened in February 2014 through December 2014 and invited audiences to consider Native American concerns about the environment through the medium of contemporary art. Artists’ works expressed emotional and cultural reflections on the status of our planet - both comfort from a sense of place and connections to the land, and the conflicts inherent in cultural genocide and pollution of sacred spaces. Read a review of the exhibit here. 

Twisted Path IV: Vital Signs opened in April 2017 through December 2017 and invited audiences to consider Native American concerns about personal and community health and wellness through the medium of contemporary art. Artists’ works will express emotional and cultural reflections on the human condition in tribal communities.

Wabanaki Guides (2013)

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Wabanaki Guides focused on the legacy of Wabanaki people serving as guides for European and American explorers, cartographers, tourists and artists from the 1600s to the present. Visitors were invited along for a simulated canoe ride down a Maine river. The journey shined a spotlight on ways in which Wabanaki knowledge of land and waterways influenced Maine’s early visitors and illustrated how this legacy is linked to the modern-day tribes, tourism, and environmental sustainability in Maine.

Visitors “climbed into a canoe with their guide” and began their journey. Along the way, they stopped at “portages” on the river bank. At each portage, visitors learned about the various things a guide needs to consider when planning a trip and what one might expect to encounter along the way. The exhibit focused on the following themes: mapping, tracking, tourism, and economics. Stories and historic accounts from various view points were weaved throughout, incorporating the voices of Wabanaki guides both past and present as well as explorers, artists, and cartographers such as Henry David Thoreau and Joseph Treat.

Learn more: Wabanaki Guides Exhibit Script

Waponahki Student Art (2001 - ongoing)

A collaboration of Maine Indian Education, the Boys & Girls Clubs of Border Towns, and the Abbe Museum.

The annual Waponahki Student Art Show brings together a wonderful variety of art created by Passamaquoddy, Penobscot, Maliseet, and Micmac students from early childhood education through high school. The styles, media, and images vary throughout the exhibition, but place, culture, and identity have a strong presence in these original works.

Learn More:
2023 Student Art Image Gallery
2022 Student Art Image Gallery
2021 Student Art Image Gallery
2020 Student Art Image Gallery

wolankeyutomon: Take Care of Everything (2019-2020)

This exhibit, a collaboration between Maritime Indigenous Artists, Inc. (MIA) and the Abbe Museum, explored the protection of waters sacred to the Wabanaki and the conservation of sea life living in those waters. It featured original artwork created by indigenous artists living in the New England region of the United States and the Canadian Maritimes (from Connecticut to Labrador).

The featured artists were Ginette Kakakos Aubin, Lorne Julien, Starr Kelly, Nancy Oakley, Nicholas Paul, Allan Saulis, Norma Saulis, Frances Soctomah, and Nelson White.

Youth Capture the Colorful Cosmos: Star Stories of the Dawnland (2015 - 2024)

In affiliation with the Smithsonian Institution.

This exhibit, a partnership with the Indian Township School, includes students from other Wabanaki communities and promotes increased interest, awareness, and knowledge of astronomy content and Wabanaki oral histories. Students focused mainly on two Passamaquoddy stories: Of the Surprising and Singular Adventures of Two Water Fairies Who Were Also Weasels, and How They Each Became the Bride of a Star, and Possesomuwinuwok: The Star People.

By partnering with schools in the Wabanaki communities, students have the opportunity to research, learn about, and photograph the cosmos using telescopes owned and maintained by the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.