Created when the artist was in his late teens, Arctic Gull is one of the earliest images produced by Mungitok. Here, the bird is not shown in repose. Instead, it is lively, its wings afluttering to suggest that the gull is alighting. Illustrated with graceful and complementary curving lines and coloured by Mungitok with extremely subtle variations of grey, there is a sense of warmth and stillness, even contemplation, that is captivatingly at odds with the dynamism of flight.

References: Image reproduced in James Houston, Eskimo Prints, (Barre, MA: Barre Publishers, 1971), “Introduction,” unpaginated. For images of all six Mungitok prints in the 1959 collection see Christine Lalonde and Leslie Boyd Ryan, Uuturautiit: Cape Dorset 1959-2009, (Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 2009), p. 29.

*No printer chop. According to Sandra Barz, in 1989, Joanassie Salamonie identified Mungitok as the printer, which was confirmed by Mungitok in 1990. Printer group thought that Osuitok Ipeelee may have been the cutter.