As one of Qamani’tuaq’s first generation of artists, Marion Tuu’luq spent her formative years following a semi-nomadic lifestyle; she was already about thirty years old before a Christian missionary made his way to the Back River area and baptized her. Tuu’luq became a devout Christian but like many older Inuit she found ways to reconcile traditional and imported systems of beliefs and cultural practices. Looking at her drawings and textile hangings drawing it is not difficult to believe that traditional practices still held a very palpable reality for the artist, even if it was one that was relegated to memory. Like those of her second husband, Luke Anguhadluq, Tuu’luq’s drawings are proof that she cherished her memories of life on the land. In Drum Dance the various participants and audience are spread across the sheet, gathered around a central, blazing yellow drum, creating a pictorial rhythm that echoes the implied music of the scene. Heightening the sense of energy are the colourful garments of many of the figures. Other nice touches to note: two of the female viewers have full facial tattoos; one man’s face is bright orange, and several of the men (and even one woman) sport truly zany haircuts. It is also interesting to note that Tuu’luq’s drawings ventured much farther into narrative than her hangings (see Lot 105). Furthermore, this drawing is organized with a more “realistic” sense of space than we would find in a drawing of a similar theme by Anguhadluq.

Literature: For examples of Tuu’luq’s drawings from the early-mid 1970s see Jean Blodgett, Tuu’luq / Anguhadluq (Winnipeg Art Gallery, 1976), cats. 4-19; see cat. 26 for a 1971 Tuu’luq wall hanging with a similar theme. For more drawings see Marion E. Jackson and Judith M. Nasby, Contemporary Inuit Drawings (Guelph: Macdonald Stewart Art Centre, 1987), cats. 29-30; Marion Jackson et al, Qamanittuaq: Where the River Widens: Drawings by Baker Lake Artists (Guelph: Macdonald Stewart Art Centre, 1994), cats. 16-19. For thematically similar drawings by Tuu’luq’s husband, Luke Anguhadluq, see Jean Blodgett, Grasp Tight the Old Ways: Selections from the Klamer Family Collection of Inuit Art (Toronto: Art Gallery of Ontario), p. 145; and Bernadette Driscoll, The Inuit Amautik: I Like My Hood To Be Full (Winnipeg Art Gallery, 1980), p. 42. See Marion E. Jackson, Baker Lake Inuit Drawings: A Study in the Evolution of Artistic Self-Consciousness, University of Michigan, PhD Dissertation, 1985, p. 153.