Large BEAR of quill, birchbark & vintage beads necklace, Paul St John, Mohawk

Description

A large black bear proudly stands atop a grassy spot on this birch bark medallion/bead chain necklace by Paul St John, Mohawk artist.  While this is the second bear necklace by Paul that I have offered, this is larger than the first and the quillwork bear takes up most of the birch bark medallion.  Black bears are frequent visitors to Paul's northern Maine home and also here at my mid-coast Maine home.  Bears often visit searching for food in the spring shortly after their winter hibernation.  As soon as summer's bounty of food arrives in the woods and fields nearby they are seen less frequently near homes.
The bear is of dyed black porcupine quills, the grass is of varying shades of dyed green quills -  quillwork on a  birchbark medallion with an inner border of natural white quills with darker ends left on.  Around the medallion's exterior is an border of tidal sweetgrass.
This is traditional quill on birch bark work innovatively made into a necklace. The beaded
neck chain
has 2 strands of vintage black glass seed beads with accents of white glass seed beads.  5 larger vintage
red glass beads are added as accents on the beaded neck chain as are 4 long porcupine quills -  2 on either side
Large necklace medallion is 4.25" in diameter. The beaded chain is 13" long from center back to top of medallion.   Last photo is of Paul with 2 of his other creations
Paul St. John lives in Maine near his mother's family.   His mother is Passamaquoddy, Maliseet and MicMac.  He grew up on the Mohawk lands in New York, his father's homeland and is an enrolled Mohawk tribal member.
There are other necklaces of this type by Paul - and some of another type that uses only porcupine quills and beading. Some of those necklaces have matching beaded/quilled barrettes.  Paul also makes quill and coiled tidal sweetgrass baskets.  These have an quilled animal, bird or Native American design on the top of the lid - find many different styles to choose from in this ebay store as well as dolls, medicine bags, moccasins, knives and more by Paul St John.