Kenojuak_Rabbit Eating Seaweed_1959
ᕿᓐᓄᐊᔪᐊᖅ ᐋᓯᕙᒃ (1927-2013)
Kenojuak Ashevak was born in 1927 at the Inuit camp of Ikirasaq on Baffin Island in the North West Territories of Canada. She died exactly one year ago today – January 8th – and we are honouring her now, one year later, because ZP did not ‘post’ during the month of January 2013.
.
One of the first women to make drawings in Cape Dorset during the 1950s, Kenojuak used graphite, coloured pencils and felt-tip pens. With the assistance of Inuit art promoter James Houston, Kenojuak made the transition to soapstone-cut print-making. Her first such print dates from 1959 and is called Rabbit Eating Seaweed. It is based on a needle-work and appliqué design she had made on a sealskin bag. Kenojuak would draw freely, with confidence in line and form, then would have her drawings transferred/cut into the print stones by one of the stone-cutters at the new West Baffin Eskimo Co-operative Workshop (“Senlavik”) which started up in 1959. After the stone-cutter had completed his incisions she would then apply one or two colours of inks to the printing surface. Sometimes the strong arms of Eegyvudluk Pootoogook would help apply the right paper-upon-stone pressure to complete the print. Kenojuak’s The Enchanted Owl, from 1960, is one of the most famous Canadian artworks internationally – instantly recognizable and emblematic of the 1960s and an “Idea” of The North.
.
Kenojuak was married three times and bore eleven children by her first husband, a hunter named Johnniebo Ashevak (1923-1972). At the time of her death from lung cancer in 2013, she was living in a wood-frame house in Kinngait (formerly Cape Dorset), Nunavut. A cheerful personality, Kenojuak was always humble about her artistic success, and thankful for the “gift” of her talent.
The sealskin bag made by Kenojuak in 1958 and from which she drew the inspiration for her first print_Rabbit Eating Seaweed
Kenojuak_Hare Spirits_sealskin stencil_1960
Kenojuak_The Woman who lives in the Sun_1960
Kenojuak_Mother Earth_1961
Kenojuak photographed in 1963 in front of one of her prints
Kenojuak_Winter Birds_1975
Kenojuak in 1980
Kenojuak_Spirit of the Owl_lithograph_1980
Kenojuak_Katajaktuiit_Throat Singers Gathering_1991
Kenojuak_In the company of birds_lithograph_1996
Kenojuak_Silver Owl_aquatint_1999
Kenojuak_Owl’s Treasure_2002
Kenojuak at work on Owl’s Treasure in 2002
Kenojuak_Submerged Spirits_etching and aquatint_2002
Kenojuak_Grande Dame_2009
Kenojuak in 2009, holding a 1968 photograph of herself with husband Johnniebo Ashevak
Kenojuak_Iridescent Char_lithograph_2009
Kenojuak_Six-part Harmony_2011
Kenojuak_Red Fox_stonecut_2012
Kenojuak_Serpentine Wolf_lithograph_2013
. . . . .
