Art and law find common ground at Coulee Art House

Taking opportunity where they found it, the couple working to create the Coulee Art House hosted a reception for the Washington Supreme Court justices last week as the court happened to schedule one of the court's traveling sessions in Nespelem.

Ben and Naomi Dupris have been working to bring together their vision for an artistic hub and resource place for youth. As the old Coulee House Motel was being torn down, they saved as much of the salvageable signs as they could, which are now inside the old theater.

Ben Dupris' mother, Anita Dupris, the chief justice at the Colville Tribal Court of Appeals, loaned him her collection of the paintings of her late brother, renowned artist Ric Gendron in preparation for this weekend's River Artist Celebration organized by the chamber of commerce.

The paintings adorned the refurbished area where popcorn had been served over decades, now a good spot for milling around and chatting, and admiring art.

The justices heard arguments at the Colville Tribes Lucy Covington Government Center Sept. 23-24, about a question of whether a woman's right to remain silent had been violated. It was the court's second visit to Nespelem, the first being in 2018.

The reception after court on Wednesday provided a social break and little tacos brought in by Auntie Dannee's Restaurant. Pockets of in-depth conversations played out at tables and chairs within the concrete building as a DJ played music, youth, some in costumes, helped keep things organized, and big, old motel signs leaned on walls.

And it's the place by a bridge across the river to which Benalex Dupris has come home.

"This place is a concrete coastline," he told the audience now assembled in purple chairs. "It's built in the brutalist style of another culture. It's built in a place that has so much division because of who we are as people. But at the same time, it sits at that bridge, and it's a connection to native and non-native, and always has been. My dad was always from Grand Coulee, and my mom was from Nespelem. That's how they saw it. He was the bike man. You know, he sat up there and he worked on the mechanics' bikes that go in and out of the dam."

Dupris took the opportunity to explain his artistic vision for the place he wants to serve as a place for kids he called storytellers, those who are Two Spirits, or young neurodivergents. "These autistic kids, these ADHD kids - they're not the special interest kids. They're not the kids to go sit in the back. These are the kids that have the power, the medicine, these are the kids that make things happen."

Dupris talk with chamber of commerce leaders after the gathering.

"What we imagine in the Coulee Art House is a place where these seats on the sides, the left and the right, slowly fall away." They'll be replaced by "big tables with power, and there's light, and there's headphones, and people can sit here and watch a movie in half volume. And you can come in and out, and there'll be places for people to make regalia, moccasins, to do crafts, to do art, to use a Dremel tool while they're sitting in here. Because all of those skills create medicine and they create our stories, and so all those skills have to be sharpened."

Coulee Art House will be open during the third annual River Artist Celebration Oct. 3rd on Mead Way in Coulee Dam, where live music will mix with an art show, food vendors, and workshops from 11 to 5, and people will vote for their favorites. Live art demonstrations are scheduled form 11-6. See the advertisement on this page.

If you'd like to see the state's Supreme Court in operation at Nespelem: