The artist also laments the losses of material culture provoked by colonization. In seeing Tlingit poles and masks and other Indigenous collections in museums all over the world, he has been forced to confront the nefarious actions inflicted upon his and other Indigenous peoples. Similarly challenging for him is the inappropriate presence of Shaman pieces in museums, where they lie dormant, devoid of their sacred life force. His first trip to the American Museum of Natural History in New York awakened him to a devastating truth: “I realized what they took from us, what they did. Those pieces were calling me. They wanted to go home. They haven’t heard our songs for over a hundred years.”³ Dempsey Bob’s sensitivity to these injustices has propelled a prolific output that is like a form of restitution: by providing a new body of work, he is able to perpetuate the culture and traditions that were nearly obliterated.

In addition to his remarkable artistic practice, Dempsey Bob is one of the most influential educators of his time. He gives lectures and workshops, and teaches courses worldwide. He is also a founding member of the Freda Diesing School of Northwest Coast Art in Terrace, British Columbia, where alongside his peers, he invests in imparting the importance of the land and culture to ensuring continuity for future generations of his people.