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Artworks
JESSIE OONARK, O.C., R.C.A (1906-1985) QAMANI'TUAQ (BAKER LAKE)
Untitled Drawing (Bird Shaman), c. 1971graphite, coloured pencil, and ink on watermarked laid paper, 6.5 x 8 in (16.5 x 20.3 cm)
signed twice, "ᐅᓇ";
inscribed by the Butlers with their inventory number, "898.78";
Accompanied by a copy of Jack Butler and Marie Bouchard, "The Butler Collection: Early Baker Lake Drawings", (Toronto: Feheley Fine Arts, 1999).LOT 19
ESTIMATE: $2,000 — $3,000The present drawing has an extraordinary kinship with Oonark’s Dream of the Bird Woman (1970, #17). In an unpublished interview with Marion Jackson, Oonark explained that the image depicts the...The present drawing has an extraordinary kinship with Oonark’s Dream of the Bird Woman (1970, #17). In an unpublished interview with Marion Jackson, Oonark explained that the image depicts the wandering hero Kiviuq’s bird wife and their two children, calling on their father to join them [1]. As in that famous print, Oonark arrives here at something more pared back than in her later works. Kiviuq’s family appears with a stark, almost ceremonial stillness, conjured through spare, deliberate linework and colour.
1. Marion Jackson, Transcripts of Interviews with Jessie Oonark and her Children, Spring 1983, p. 14.
ND
References: See Dream of the Bird Woman in First Arts, 5 Dec 2022, Lot 12. See Bird/Human imagery in Oonark’s work Untitled (Spirit Figures), c. 1970 in First Arts, Toronto, 28 May 2019, Lot 24, as well as Untitled Work on Cloth (Bird Spirits), c. 1968-70, Lot 48, 5 Dec 2022, and elsewhere.Provenance
Ex. Coll. Jack & Sheila Butler, Qamani’tuaq (Baker Lake) / Toronto;
Their sale, Feheley Fine Arts, 1999;
Acquired from the above John and Joyce Price, Seattle.Exhibitions
Toronto, Feheley Fine Arts, The Butler Collection: Early Baker Lake Drawings, [May?] 1999, no cat. no.Publications
Jack Butler and Marie Bouchard, The Butler Collection: Early Baker Lake Drawings, (Toronto: Feheley Fine Arts, 1999), no cat. no., pp. 26-27, reproduced p. 27.
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