This luminous stencil print perfectly marries Kenojuak’s imagery with meticulous inking and stencilling. The amorphous, abstracted birds flow across the page in perfect harmony. Kenojuak remembered the shapes and movement of the stories elders would tell, using their hands to create constantly changing and whimsical patterns. The same sense of the ethereal is augmented by the variations in the colour of blue skillfully blended by the printer, Iyola Kingwatsiak. The result is the radiant abstracted imagery of Birds from the Sea.

Following the success of her print Rabbit Eating Seaweed in the 1959 inaugural print collection, the 1960 collection (released in 1961) can certainly be considered Kenojuak’s “breakout” year. Birds from the Sea is one of ten lovely prints by Kenojuak released that year; other masterpieces include her most celebrated work, The Enchanted Owl, also featured in this catalogue (Lot 30). Birds from the Sea is arguably the 1960 print that most resembles Rabbit Eating Seaweed, but we can already see the sureness and clarity of Kenojuak’s draughtsmanship in this image. The original graphite drawing was fairly small and was enlarged using graph paper before the stencil was cut.

Although Kenojuak was a gifted sculptor as well (see Lot 39), it was her drawings and prints that captured the interest of generations of admirers. Awarded the Order of Canada as well as several honorary degrees, Kenojuak Ashevak is the subject of two monographs and her works are found in prominent national and international collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the National Art Gallery of Canada.