Bill Reid

William "Bill" Ronald Reid Jr. OBC RCA (12 January 1920 – 13 March 1998) also known as Iljuwas,[1] was a Haida artist whose works include jewelry, sculpture, screen-printing, and paintings.

[2] Producing over one thousand original works during his fifty-year career, Reid is regarded as one of the most significant Northwest Coast artists of the late twentieth century.

During his spare time, he made regular trips to the Royal Ontario Museum and admired the carved Haida pole installed in the main stairwell, which originated from his grandmother's village of T'aanuu.

During this time Reid also worked on salvaging artifacts, including many intricately carved totem poles, which were then moldering in abandoned village sites.

[15] The exhibit catalog was later published by the University of British Columbia Press as Bill Reid: Beyond the Essential Form by Karen Duffek, Curator: Contemporary Visual Arts & Pacific Northwest.

[19] Reid's Raven and the First Men carving based on the Haida legend was unveiled[20] at the University of British Columbia Museum of Anthropology (MOA) in April 1986.

The stamp was designed by Pierre-Yves Pelletier based on the sculpture The Spirit of Haida Gwaii (1991) by William Ronald Reid in the Canadian Embassy, Washington, United States.

[24] Two of his sculptures, The Raven and the First Men and Spirit of Haida Gwaii, are prominently featured on the $20 note in the Bank of Canada's new Canadian Journey (2004) issue, paired with a quotation from author Gabrielle Roy.

[26] Reid participated in the Haida-led blockades of logging roads that helped save the rain forests of Gwaii Haanas (South Moresby).

In July 1998 friends and relatives paddled Lootaas, a large cedar canoe carved by Reid for Expo 86, on a two-day journey along the Pacific coast to bring his ashes to Tanu Island in Haida Gwaii, the site of his mother's village of New Clew.