Jessie Oonark relocated to the settlement of Baker Lake a widow and, looking to improve the economic situation for her and her family, began to work manual labour jobs. She first worked at the Hudson’s Bay Company but later was employed as a custodian at the Anglican Church. It was during the latter occupation that Oonark commented to teacher Bernard Mullen that, with the proper materials, she was certain she could produce artworks better than those of his schoolchildren [1]. Oonark’s artistic potential was then recognized by Edith Dodds, who sent a handful of Oonark's drawings to Kinngait to be made into prints for inclusion in the forthcoming print collections. Three stonecut prints based on these drawings, including Tatooed Faces — the sister print to Women's Tatooed Faces — were included in the 1960 and 1961 Cape Dorset catalogues.

Comparing this unique experimental proof with the final print published in 1960 affords us an interesting and important glimpse into the extent of the experimentation in Cape Dorset in these early years. At first glance the image seems almost identical to the stonecut, but clear differences are apparent upon close inspection. Most immediately noticeable is that the orientation of Women's Tatooed Faces is horizontal rather than vertical. Moreover, two of the faces in the stonecut are not present in our Women's Tatooed Faces. And those that are present are not in the same order. That they are reversed makes sense, since a stonecut print is the mirror image of the stone, while a rubbing is a positive. But the two left-hand faces of the rubbing are, in fact, duplicates of those next to them; remove them and you have a mirror image of the stonecut - minus the two extra faces (row 2 left, and the larger face at the bottom). So, the rubbing was taken from the stone block, just not all of it.

James Houston had learned the Japanese method of taku-hanga stone rubbing from the printmaker Un’ichi Hiratsuka, but only two tiny editions of Cape Dorset prints were ever made using this medium; Lukta Qiatsuq’s Owl from 1959 is one of them (see First Arts, Toronto, 13 July 2021, Lot 107). Our guess is that this fascinating and incredibly rare stone rubbing, Women’s Tatooed Faces, was made before the decision was made to print the image as a stonecut.

*According to Sandra Barz, the hand stamp on this print was that of James Houston’s, who explained that this experimental proof was used as a teaching tool for the artists in the workshop

1. See First Arts, Toronto, 1 December 2020, Lot 52 for the first known drawing by the artist.

References: For information on stone rubbings, see Norman Vorano, Inuit Print: Japanese Inspiration, Early Printmaking in the Canadian Arctic, (Ottawa, ON: Canadian Museum of Civilization Corporation, 2011), p. 54 & 67. See also “Eskimo Prints,” Eskimo Graphic Art, (Ottawa: Department of Northern and Indian Affairs, 1959) for a description of the rubbing process. For additional information on Oonark’s artistic beginnings, see the landmark exhibition catalogue by Jean Blodgett and Marie Bouchard, Jessie Oonark: A Retrospective, (Winnipeg: Winnipeg Art Gallery, 1986), pp. 16-17 & p.29 ff. Tatooed Faces is illustrated on p. 96, cat. 5.