Emily Carr, to supplement her income, produced crafts such as hooked rugs and pottery. For the pottery, she used clay that she dug herself from locations such as Dallas Road in Victoria. In a homemade kiln in her back yard, she fired her hand-built clay objects, which included candlesticks, totems, pots, lamps and bowls, such as this one. These single-fired objects were then painted with a variety of Indigenous motifs. She often signed her clay objects Klee Wyck. The name was name given to her by the Nuu-chah-nulth people of western Vancouver Island, which meant “Laughing One.”

This work has remained in the same family for almost 100 years until its consignment to Heffel this spring.