Transformation mask

These masks usually depict an outer, animal visage, which the performer can open by pulling a string to reveal an inner human face carved in wood to symbolize the wearer moving from the natural world to a supernatural realm.

[3] Settlers, missionaries and the Canadian government sought to end the Potlatch because they wanted the indigenous people to assimilate to Anglo-Canadian beliefs and customs.

[3] To make the masks, natural, organic materials are used such as red cedar bark and other types of wood that are commonly used by these tribes to construct buildings and other structures.

Wright met with Burke Museum Curator Emeritus Bill Holm, who then showed her a picture of a Kwakwaka'wakw eagle mask displayed in Art of the Northwest Coast Indians by Robert Bruce Inverarity.

[5] Marvin Oliver, an artist who once worked alongside Holm, was inspired by the football team's first logo and created a redesign in 1975 that followed a more traditional form of the northern Northwest Coast principles.

During the creation of the logo's original design in 1975, traditional art from tribes such as Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian and Kwakwaka'wakw were becoming more and more familiar along the Pacific Northwest Coast.

[6] The original eagle mask that influenced the Seattle Seahawks' 1976 logo was discovered in the northeast side of Vancouver Island.

[5] Burke Museum in Seattle, Washington displayed the original transformation mask as part of an exhibit inspired by Native American artists from November 22, 2014, to July 27, 2015.