Tattooed Women is a poetic celebration of the Inuit tradition of soot tattooing, a practice nearly erased with the arrival of Christianity in the Canadian Arctic. Unlike other traditions that were undertaken in secrecy, this one endured mostly as cultural memory, preserved largely through art, as seen, for example, in The Woman Who Lives in the Sun, the famous print by the artist’s mother, Kenojuak Ashevak. In Tattooed Women, Arnaqu both celebrates the traditional and imagines a modern body tattoo, with a depiction of two women who, though facing away, radiate freedom and strength – and defy the images of coy nudes in Western art. The lovely printmaking by Studio PM utilizes rich, warm inks that boldly contrast against a neutral background. The resurgence of Inuit tattooing today, championed by figures like Aaju Peter and Alethea Arnaquq-Baril, may be partly inspired by the beauty of powerful prints such as this one.

Literature: Tattooed Women was reproduced on the cover of Inuit Art Quarterly (Vol. 23, No 4, Winter 2008), and on p. 22; also reproduced in Christine Lalonde and Leslie Boyd Ryan, Uuturautiit: Cape Dorset Celebrates 50 Years of Printmaking, exh. cat., (Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 2009), p. 51, cat. no. 57.