Tuna Iquliq was born in Baker Lake but lived in Rankin Inlet for several years. Influenced by Tiktak and Kavik to some extent, Tuna nonetheless developed a unique brutalist style. Perhaps best known for his wonderful depictions of seated women of the 1970s, [1] Tuna also produced several spectacular heads (see First Arts 28 May 2019, Lot 48). This epic and enigmatic sculpture presents a massive head with faces gazing off in all four directions. Its precise meaning can only be guessed at, but the fangs certainly provide a clue. Perhaps Four Faces represents a fanged shaman with special powers of sight or attended by three ancestor spirits.

1. See First Arts 12 July 2020, Lot 38. For other examples see Art Gallery of Ontario, The People Within: Art from Baker Lake, (Toronto: AGO, 1976), unpaginated.

References: For a Head by Iquliq (WAG collection) from 1964 (and two human figures from 1963) see George Swinton, Eskimo Sculpture, (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1965), pp. 159-161. The figures are also illustrated in Canadian Eskimo Arts Council, Sculpture/Inuit, (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1971), cats. 247 and 368. The Head is reproduced also in George Swinton, Sculpture of the Inuit, (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1972/92) fig. 666. For other sculpted heads by the artist see Norman Zepp, The Williamson Collection of Inuit Sculpture, (Regina: Norman Mackenzie Art Gallery, 1987), cats. 40, 41; and Winnipeg Art Gallery, Eskimo Carvers of the Keewatin N.W.T. (Winnipeg: Winnipeg Art Gallery, 1964), cat. 35, p. 26. For an important and unusually large and brutal Head by Iquliq see First Arts Auctions, May 2019, Lot 48. For another important work by the artist see First Arts, July 2020, Lot 38.