Artwork copyright Robert Stauffer. Photo courtesy of Washington State Arts Commission, 2017.

Prince and Four Frogs Drum, 1992

Robert Stauffer
American (born 1953)

Location: Bethel Middle School, Spanaway

About the Artwork

Non-Native artist Rob Stauffer’s Prince and Four Frogs Drum is hand-made and hand-painted. Many elements of the artwork are based on traditions from the Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast. Stauffer notes, "This drum depicts a Northwest Coast story about a son of a chief [a "prince" in European traditions] who goes out salmon fishing in his canoe, with four friends following in another canoe. Roasting their catch on stakes over a fire, small frogs begin jumping on the salmon, annoying the prince greatly. He tosses one, two, three, and finally a fourth frog into the fire. Then the voice of a woman is heard from the direction of a nearby volcano bemoaning the death of the little frogs, 'Oh my children! Oh my children! What has happened to my children!' Fleeing in their canoe, the four friends are destroyed one by one by Volcano Woman. The prince escapes back to the village to tell his story, but he dies from fright as a rockslide wipes out the village except for a few people who live to tell the story."

This artwork was acquired for the State Art Collection in partnership with Bethel School District.

About the Artist

Robert Stauffer is a Northwest artist whose art focuses on the Native American artistic traditions of the Pacific Northwest Coast. He is a non-Native artist. Stauffer learned to carve after studying with Native American artists at Tillicum Village on Blake Island, in Puget Sound, Western Washington.