Swimming Muskox with Young is a substantial work, its broad horizontal sweep giving the sculpture an entirely different physical character from Osuitok's more attenuated creations (see Lot 37 & 111).

Carved from the newly discovered stone deposit at Markham Bay, the sculpture's warm brown surface is beautifully suited to its subject, recalling the deep, earth-toned coat of the muskox.

Along the neck, fine scores follow the direction of the hair, breaking the otherwise smooth planes with hundreds of small cuts that describe the thickness and texture of the coat. The marks are especially effective around the head and shoulders, where they gather beneath the horns and make the great animal's shaggy covering palpable in the stone.

There is something particularly appealing about the subject because it places the muskox in an element we do not ordinarily associate with it. Muskoxen are not natural swimmers. In fact, they are reluctant to enter deep water but they are capable of swimming across rivers and have been observed doing so in the Arctic. Osuitok, here, captures something of the peculiar spectacle of it. The muskox's great body, so strongly associated with the solid ground of the tundra, is here imagined afloat. The long, low silhouette seems to skim across the surface, while the heavy coat is suggested through broad, sweeping passages that follow the length of the body.

All the while, a little calf rides close against its back, carried safely through the water by the great breadth of the larger animal's body. The calf's exaggerated smallness heightens the scale of the larger muskox, giving the sculpture an especially tender sense of intimacy.

ND