Alaska Native artist carves cultures into crafts

FAIRBANKS, Alaska (KTUU) – At the World Eskimo Indian Olympics there is a group of artists gathered on the elevated track above the arena, surrounding the competition in creative energy.

Among the artists is Vince Gregory, a carver who says he enjoys the WEIO event as it gives him a chance to reconnect with relatives, friends, and other artists — and is a chance for him to find new inspirations and trade works with other artists.

“It’s like just one big village family reunion, and it’s really cool. It’s really heartwarming. It makes my heart sing and dance,” Gregory said.

Gregory — who is of Yup’ik and Norwegian descent — uses the name Carving Fox and blends his knowledge of Alaska Native ivory carvings with his Nordic heritage.

“Like on my bracelet you see, since I’m part Scandinavian, you see in the Norse runes the Carving Fox,” Gregory said.

Sometimes Gregory has to get a bit inventive with the way he does his work when creating pieces with certain disconnects.

“As far as I understand, in the Norse language, there’s no word for carving, so the closest equivalent I could find was ‘fox artist’. And there’s no letter V in the runes either so I had to kind of switch it up a little and make it so it’s more accurate,” Gregory said

A self-taught artist, Gregory says that he has been an ivory carver since 2012. He currently works in a shop in Downtown Anchorage called the Alaska Art Alliance.

In addition to the bracelet with inlaid Nordic runes, Gregory displayed a watch featuring a band of ivory and runes displaying the time. But the centerpiece of his display of works was a chessboard made completely out of ivory and baleen, complete with handcrafted figures.

“The end result, I think, turned out pretty beautifully. And you know, with that in mind, the longest I’ve spent on any of the chess pieces was about six and a half hours. And with each piece, I only had one shot to do it,” Gregory said.

While he isn’t carving, Gregory works as a preschool teacher. He says that he worked many sleepless nights creating each of the pieces before it came to completion.

“I only got one shot at this and I was working seven days a week,” Gregory said. “I was like, I just want to finish this so I can go home and sleep! But once you set your mind to anything, there’s nothing stopping you.”

For his next project, Gregory plans to tackle the challenge of creating frames for sunglasses out of ivory and baleen.

“That’s my goal — do something no one’s ever done before. And to date I’ve seen plenty of people make goggles, like the snow goggles, but I’ve never seen someone make, you know, actual sunglasses,” Gregory said.

Gregory’s advice to aspiring artists is that art is supposed to be messy — and fun. He’s now created over 1,000 ivory rings, but says that it took that practice to start creating something new.

“You never know, you might make magic happen,” Gregory said.