An earlier example of Lucassie Ikkidluak's celebrated muskoxen, this sculpture predates the artist's later preference for carving the animals without an integrated stone base. Here, the beast seems pressed firmly into the mass from which it is carved, with its great head hanging low beneath a high, humped back, while four short, stout legs brace the body with tremendous solidity.

As in the best of Ikkidluak's work, much is made of the animal's surface. Long parallel cuts score the flanks and shoulders, suggesting the dense fall of shaggy hair, while the broad face and blunt muzzle are smoothed and swollen into softer planes. The inset horns, made of caribou antler, sharpen the silhouette and introduce a pale, polished contrast to the stone.

The integral base further emphasizes the sculpture's sense of weight and permanence, while the lowered head and subtly forward posture introduce an effective suggestion of contained power and movement. The muskox seems to bear down through its forequarters, heavy, stubborn and immensely strong, as though all that stone were gathering itself for one step forward.

MBL