The sculptural style of Salluit (Sugluk), a small community in northern Nunavik (Arctic Québec), has long been one of our favourites. Although Salluit carvers made art before and long after, the community enjoyed a brief but brilliant artistic flowering between the years 1955 and 1960. Most adults in the community – women as well as men – became carvers; amazingly, for a brief time Salluit carving production exceeded Cape Dorset’s! Sadly, a lack of good carving stone and sagging market demand for the Salluit style soon ended the brave experiment.

As is often the case with Salluit artists, we know almost nothing about Alacie Sakiagaq. She is not even mentioned in the 1976 book The Artists of Sugluk, P.Q. by Barry A. Roberts. From old community lists we have discovered one interesting detail: her husband worked for probably a couple of years on Resolution Island, which in the 1950s housed an American military base and DEW line installation, and returned to Salluit in 1959, but we’re not certain if his family had joined him there (they eventually moved to Kangiqsujjuaq c. 1965). Only a handful of sculptures by Alacie Sakiagaq are known to exist, and only one masterpiece: this remarkable Standing Woman Holding her Braids.

The sculpture is a classic example of Salluit art from this period, however it is unusually tall and truly imposing in its sculptural presence. Overall, it has an air of solemnity; the woman’s facial expression, almost dour when seen straight on, softens as you move around the work; perhaps tending her hair has been more work than she expected. The trouble was worth it, however; we cannot recall ever seeing a more spectacular set of braids. Interestingly, braids feature quite prominently in Salluit art. We know of numerous examples where the artist has lavished special attention on women’s plaited hair (see references), and we must wonder whether long, impressive braids were a particular source of female pride and status in this community. In this sculpture, the braids seem to have a life force all their own, almost completely dominating the composition. Sakiagaq’s treatment of the rest of the figure is, by comparison, simplified; the sculptural shapes are beautifully formed and quite powerful, but they are unadorned – there aren’t the folds and pleats that we often see on clothing in Salluit works – so the woman’s bare shoulders and plain amautiq act as the perfect foil to her glorious coiffure.

References: For sculptures of rather different form by this artist see George Swinton, Sculpture of the Inuit, (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1972/92), fig. 413, p. 178; and Barbara Lipton, Arctic Vision: Art of the Canadian Inuit, (Ottawa: Canadian Arctic Producers with the assistance of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, 1984), cat. C11, p. 65 (that catalogue features a portrait photo of the artist). As mentioned, Barry Roberts’s 1976 book The Artists of Sugluk, P.Q. does not even mention Alacie Sakiagaq or her husband Mathewsie (who also carved a bit), and only Mathewsie is mentioned in the Art Gallery of Windsor Salluit catalogue (see below). The are many fine Salluit sculptures that depict women holding their braids; for example see First Arts, 5 Dec. 2022, Lot 70 (Maggie Ittuvik Tayarak); Maria von Finckenstein ed., Celebrating Inuit Art 1948-1970, (Hull, QC: Canadian Museum of Civilization, 1999), p. 95 (Johnny Issaja Papigatok); that work (as well as a fine example by Maggie Ittuvik Tayarak) is also illustrated in Art Gallery of Windsor, Sugluk: Sculpture in Stone 1953-1959, (Windsor: AGW, 1992), p. 45. Ittuvik’s sculpture is also illustrated in George Swinton, Sculpture of the Inuit, (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1972/92), fig. 408, p. 178. Another Salluit sculpture that features braids prominently is Paulosikitak Alaku’s Mother and Children from 1959 in the Sarick Collection at the AGO (see Hessel, 1998, pl. 51, p. 67).