PORTLAND, ORE. - The Portland Art Museum, itself rich in Native American material, is the first United States venue for "Down from the Shimmering Sky: Masks of the Northwest Coast," a touring exhibition organized by the Vancouver Art Gallery.

Bill Mercer, Portland's curator of Native American Art, emphasizes, "This has never been done before, there has never been a major museum exhibition specifically devoted to Northwest Coast masks. It's really quite surprising but that's the case. The show has both historic pieces and contemporary pieces; it really emphasizes the whole idea of continuity. Native American art and culture is still alive and very dynamic."

The curatorial duties for the exhibition were divided between Bruce Grenville, senior curator at the Vancouver Art Gallery; Robert Joseph, a Kwakwaka'wakw chief and advisor on land claims and Native rights; and Peter Macnair, former curator of anthropology at the Royal British Columbia Museum. Upon his retirement two years ago, Macnair was immediately involved in the rapid organization of the project, which was pulled together in an astonishing 11 months, thanks in part to the networking ability of the three curators.

"We had a very short time line," Macnair admits. "I'm continually surprised that we managed to make the deadline. The important thing with exhibits that feature Native American material is to involve Native American people.

"So one of the three curators was Chief Robert Joseph, and he has contacts all up and down the coast," Mcnair continues. "We actually approached 11 different Northwest Coast nations from Washington State through British Columbia to southeastern Alaska and presented the thesis for the exhibit to them. We gained their support and endorsement and had cultural advisors from each of those eleven nations who provided some guidance as to what was and what was not appropriate to exhibit." Certain masks, for example, are shamanic pieces, which should not be displayed in this context.

In the end, the exhibition includes more than 150 dramatic examples, which are divided into five sections: the human face, the sky world, the mortal world, the undersea world and the spirit world. The last four categories represent four dimensions of the cosmos as perceived by Native Americans of the Northwest Coast. As is the case in much religious imagery, the masks help make spirits and spiritual concepts visible to the worshippers. Masks performed this function during the dance performances that were an essential part of the potlatch, a central ceremony in traditional culture and society.

During the years when this cultural identity was discouraged and the potlatch banned, masks survived, in part, because artists discovered that they had commercial possibilities, a pragmatic concept which has preserved many Native American traditions.

The appearance of these contemporary examples alongside ethnographic artifacts, mentioned above, is a distinctive feature of "Down from the Shimmering Sky." Macnair outlined the strict rules, which governed the choice of one recent creation over another for this show.

"As far as the contemporary artists are concerned, we had certain criteria we laid down," he says. "One was that they had achieved international recognition as living contemporary artists working in the art form. The second is that they had to have mastered the traditional art form, even though in some cases they have gone beyond that in the examples selected. And finally they had to have contributed to that tradition. All those selected have at times produced works for traditional use in the potlatch or various Northwest Coast dance ceremonies. They have to be part of community and serve their chiefs as well as just being part of the art market."

The exhibition catalogue, Down from the Shimmering Sky: Masks of the Northwest Coast, published by the Vancouver Art Gallery, is already in its second edition and can be ordered through bookstores, online, or from the Portland Art Museum shop. Also on view through July 11 is "Edward Curtis: The North American Indian" featuring vintage photographs from the museum's permanent collection.

After closing in Portland on July 11, ""Down from the Shimmering Sky" moves to the Gilcrease Museum in Tulsa for a August 27 to November 7 engagement. Negotiations have been underway for some time to secure a New York City location to accommodate the 10,000 square foot exhibition and allow visitors on this coast to view these superb examples of religious art from the Northwest.

The Portland Art Museum is at 1219 S.W. Park Avenue in downtown Portland. Telephone 503/226-2811; web address is www.pam.org.