Nalenik began carving as a young teenager but always considered himself to be a "traditional Inuk," preferring to live in outpost camps until the late 1970s. While his early works are notable for their high level of polish, by the mid 1980s Nalenik became preoccupied with texture. He invented a highly distinctive style by contrasting matte torsos with highly polished heads and limbs in his works and is especially famous for the large bears he carved in this manner (see First Arts, July 2020, Lot 99 for a fine example). The Markham Bay stone that Nalenik favoured is less lustrous and precious than the jade-like serpentine used by most of his peers, but Nalenik was able to make this material sing by giving his sculptures his trademark treatment. This massive and truly dynamic upright Walrus has much the same appeal as his best dancing bears. Spectacular.

References: For similarly large walruses by the artist see First Arts, 1 Dec. 2020, Lot 140; and Walker’s Auctions, Ottawa, May 2012, Lot 176. For equally large and stylistically similar examples of bears by the artist see First Arts Auction, 12 July 2020, Lot 99; 5 Dec. 2022, Lot 152; See also Amway Environmental Foundation, Masters of the Arctic: Art in the Service of the Earth (1990), cover and pp. 66-67 (international touring exhibition inaugurated at the United Nations General Assembly Gallery in NYC, 1989). See also George Swinton, Sculpture of the Inuit, (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1992), fig. 893.