The Legend of the Snake Sturgeon, which dates to the start of the 1960s, is an example of two of the most formidable influences on not only Morrisseau’s early works but on his career as an artist.

The work was owned first by Susan A. Ross. An artist herself, she was a pioneer collector of Morrisseau's work. The two met while she was sketching in the Beardmore area and continued to correspond by letter in the early 1960s. These letters reveal that Ross not only provided Morrisseau with artistic supplies but also that Morrisseau sent a number of works to Ross in Port Arthur for distribution to buyers at the Lakehead. While we cannot say with certainty, we speculate that this may have been one such work that Ross elected to purchase for her own collection.

In his 1989 publication, Dear M: Letters from a Gentleman of Excess, Jack Pollock describes how he was encouraged to meet Morrisseau by Ross in the summer of 1962 (p. 37-8). Pollock explains that after his first meeting with Morrisseau and expressing interest in his works, Ross “drove me to Norval’s house the next day” (p. 39). The resultant show in October 1962 has taken on iconic stature. The relationship between Ross and Morrisseau would wax and wane over the years but Morrisseau obviously held his friend in high regard, an eponymous pen and ink portrait of Susan Ross by Morrisseau is held in the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa (ac. no. 41930).

Of equal importance is the composition and colour of this early work, which shows the clear influence of the traditional Anishnaabe subject matter and style that was encouraged by another of Morrisseau’s friends and mentors, Selwyn Dewdney. In the late 1950s, Dewdney mapped, recorded, and attempted to interpret the pictographs found on the Canadian Shield. His research included interviewing locals to inform on the subjects that were found at 290 sites that he surveyed in Ontario. One such informant on the oral traditions and shamanism of the Anishinaabe was Norval Morrisseau. The two met in 1960 and quickly bonded over a mutual admiration of modern art. Dewdney recognized Morrisseau’s artistic talents and, devoted to promoting Morrisseau’s art to a southern market, encouraged the artist to adopt a distinctly earthy palette and to depict his figures in a summary style akin to the rock paintings.

In 1965, Dewdney asked Morrisseau to collaborate with him on a book project. In Legends of my People: The Great Ojibway Morrisseau (as edited by Dewdney) explains the subject matter of his art and sheds light on the meaning of the present painting. We learn of the fearsome snake sturgeons that inhabited a section of the sacred lake called Mesinama Sahegun, which is described in this publication as being “now under many feet of water due to the hydro dam,” eliding with the artist’s pencil inscription on the verso of this work. (p. 34). The text describes a “big sturgeon with a red belly and box-shaped head.” It was held that, if eaten, one would become a snake or be smothered by them.

To what extent we can understand Dewdney's intervention as a dilemma remains a great debate in current discourse. In her 2016 article for the Journal of Canadian Art History, Ruth B. Phillips wrote, “In much the same way as Picasso’s discovery of ancient Iberian sculpture catalyzed his breakthrough into cubism, Morrisseau’s access to the bold outlines and flat pictorial space of Anishinaabe rock paintings proved the key to his reinvention of Anishinaabe tradition as a modernist art form. (p. 15).

What cannot be contested, however, are the artistic achievements of Morrisseau at this period, as represented by the present lot. The Legend of the Snake Sturgeon is a visual chorus of an incredibly limited colour and line. Twelve silhouetted men with glowing eyes are staged in a canoe, atop a lakeline that thrums in Morrisseau’s warm russet red. Below the water surface lies the fearsome creature, its “red belly” shown in the “x-ray” technique that would become Morrisseau’s signature style. In the distance, Morrisseau established his shoreline with deliberately rudimentary details: scant pine trees and tents and a small glowing sun that watches over the scene.

References: For more on Morrisseau’s early career see Ruth B. Phillips, “Morrisseau’s ‘Entrance’: Negotiating Primitivism, Modernism, and Anishnaabe Tradition” in Norval Morriseau: Shaman Artist, exh. cat. (Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 2006), pp. 42-77. For additional information on Dewdney, his amature efforts at ethnography, and his relationship to Morrisseau see Ruth B. Phillips, “Between Rocks and Hard Places: Indigenous Lands, Settler Art Histories, and the ‘Battle for the Woodlands,” Journal of Canadian Art History, vol. 37, no. 1, p. 10-47.  For an extensive look at Susan Ross’s relationship with Morrisseau, see Carmen L. Robertson, Mythologizing Norval Morrisseau, Art and the Colonial Narrative in the Canadian Media, (Manitoba: University of Manitoba Press, 2016), p. 65. See also James R. Stevens, Ten Generations - Then an Artist: The Susan A. Ross Story, (Thunder Bay, ON: The Thunder Bay Historical Museum Society, Inc., 2017), p. 23- 24; Susan, 1983, pen and black ink on wove paper, 58.6 x 73.8 cm, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, (accession no. 41930), is reproduced in Carmen L. Robertson, Norval Morrisseau: His Life and Work, (Toronto: Art Canada Institute, 2016), p. 7; see, p. 6-7 for a discussion of his relationship to Ross. To read about Jack Pollock’s memories of Ross and Morrisseau see Jack Pollock, Dear M: Letters from a Gentleman of Excess, (Toronto: McCelland & Stewart Inc, 1989), p. 37-44