An iconic totem pole in Stanley Park’s Brockton Point is set to be relocated in early September, this year.
In a release Wednesday, the City of Vancouver announced that after 40 years of calling Stanley Park its home, the six-metre Kakaso’las totem pole carved by Kwakwaka’wakw artist Ellen Neel will be returned to the Museum of Anthropology (MOA) at the University of British Columbia (UBC).
The city says this follows a loan agreement between MOA and the Vancouver Board of Parks and Recreation that dates back to 1985.
The relocation from Brockton Point to MOA is scheduled for Wednesday, Sept. 4, 2024.
The city says the relocation is happening because of the age and condition of the pole.
“Based on an assessment of the pole, the Neel family decided that the pole should return to MOA where it can be preserved into the future and continue to tell the history of Ellen Neel and her legacy,” it said.
The Kakaso’las totem pole was carved in 1955, and features prominent figures like the Thunderbird with a whale on its chest on top, followed by a Sea-Bear holding a killer whale, a man holding a frog, Bak’was (the Wild Man of the Woods), Dzunuk’wa (Giant of the Woods), and a Raven at its base.
The city says the pole was carved in Neel’s Ferguson Point Studio at Stanley Park commissioned by the Woodward’s Department Store and first installed in Edmonton, Alberta in their Westmount Mall locations.
Woodward’s then donated the pole to the MOA in 1984.
“It was restored by Robert Neel (Ellen Neel’s son) before being installed at Brockton Point through the long-term loan agreement in 1985,” the city said.
The city says protocols or ceremonies that need to happen for the pole’s relocation are being decided by Neel’s family and the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations are being kept informed.
-With files from Johna Baylon.