PEGGY EKAGINA (1919-1992) KUGLUKTUK (COPPERMINE)
dated and signed, "74 / EKAGINA".
ESTIMATE: $3,000 — $5,000
PRICE REALIZED: $4,636.00
Further images
Ekagina began carving in the mid 1950s and is widely considered to be the most important Kugluktuk artist. Large pieces of stone were hard to come by in the community, which explains why the great majority of carvings are small figures, or tableau-style works pieced together on bases (the best-known being igloo scenes with removable tops). Ekagina forged her own path, creating mostly animal-human transformation imagery in the form of lovely and haunting sea goddess-like creatures or female shamans. Most are quite small, but Female Muskox Shaman is impressively large, very similar to an example in the Winnipeg Art Gallery collection illustrated in Hessel, Inuit Art: An Introduction (1998), fig. 39, p. 52. Our version is just as powerfully built yet carved with great sensitivity. We love the way the horns might be mistaken as part of the hairdo framing the woman’s gentle face.
Provenance
Private Collection, BC;Maynard's Fine Art & Antiques, Richmond, BC, 24 April 2019, Lot 228;
Acquired from the above by the present Private Collection, Ontario.
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