Exhibition catalogue from Backstory: Nuuchaanulth Ceremonial Curtains and the Work of Ḳi-ḳe-in at the Belkin (17 January–28 March 2010) with an essay by Charlotte Townsend-Gault. Curated by Townsend-Gault, the exhibition brings together for the first time thliitsapilthim or ceremonial curtains by Nuuchaanulth painter Ḳi-ḳe-in (Ron Hamilton) and historical curtains from museum and private collections in Canada and the United States. Painted on cotton, these thliitsapilthim are amongst the largest (up to 3 metres high by 18 metres long) portable two-dimensional paintings in the world. Historical ancestral exploits and episodes from family histories, conflicts, captures and alliances are seen in these striking narrative works. The Nuuchaanulth were the first people Europeans encountered when Captain James Cook landed at Yuquot in 1778 in what is now British Columbia. Though much of the art of the Northwest Coast has come to be associated with poles and carvings of the Haida and Kwakwaka’wakw, the Nuuchaanulth have made and used ceremonial curtains for thousands of years on the west coast of what is now called Vancouver Island.