By Bill Reid. At the Canadian Embassy in Washington, DC.

"The Canadian Embassy in Washington, D.C., is proud to be the home of Haida artist Bill Reid’s largest and most complex work of sculpture: a Haida canoe carrying thirteen figures, cast in bronze. This massive piece of architectural jewelry is 6 m (20 ft) long, nearly 4 m (13 ft) high and weighs close to 5000 kg (11,000 lb). The sculpture took five years to make and was installed in 1991.
"A living web of stories clings to the creatures in this canoe. Perched at the stem, holding the steering oar, is the Raven, who is the trickster of the Northwest Coast and the principal figure in countless Haida stories. Crouched under his tail is the Mouse Woman, the traditional guide and advisor of those who travel from the human world to the nonhuman realms of Haida myth.
"In the bow of the boat, facing astern, is the Grizzly Bear. Near him, facing forward and paddling on the port side, is his human wife, the Bear Mother. Between the Bear and his human wife are their children, the Two Cubs. Reid calls them Good Bear and Bad Bear, alluding not to Haida myth but to a children’s poem by A.A. Milne. (They are easily distinguished: Bad Bear’s ears point back and Good Bear’s forward.)
"Behind the Bear Mother is the Beaver. Behind him is the Dogfish Woman, a shape-changing creature who is part human and part shark.
"Across from the Bear Mother, on the starboard side, is the Eagle. Beneath him, perched on the gunwale, is the Frog. Arched across the centre of things is the Wolf, with his claws in the Beaver’s back and his teeth in the Eagle’s wing. Behind the shoulders of the Wolf and beneath the Raven’s massive head is a human paddler. And at the centre of this menagerie stands another human being: the shaman, the chief, whose title in Haida is Kilstlaai. The robe he wears and the staff in his hand — a sculpture-within-a-sculpture, portraying the Seabear, the Raven and the Killer Whale — allude to stories central to the Haida view of the world.
"Apart from their importance in Haida mythology, many of these figures are crucial to Haida heraldry. Raven and Eagle, for instance, are emblems of the two halves or sides of the Haida social order. And the Wolf is a crest of Reid’s own family or clan, the Qqaadasghu Qiighawaai of the Raven side.
"The figures carved on Haida totem poles are often chosen for mythological reasons, often for heraldic ones. On some poles, the figures function in both terms at once. The same complexity of myth and social symbolism is at work here in The Spirit of Haida Gwaii.
"The canoe contains both Raven and Eagle, women and men, a rich man and a poorer man, and animals as well as human beings. Not all is peace and contentment in this crowded boat. There are nervous faces and tempers running high. But whatever their differences, they are paddling together, in one boat, headed in one direction."
-- from https://connect2canada.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/EmbassyBrochure.pdf
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