Description

The poor mother bear is trying to get some shut-eye, while her cubs are romping all over her in this playful carving of Bear with Cubs by Kooyoo Peter from Cape Dorset-Kinngait. Kooyoo chose a nice dark serpentine stone with blueish and gold highlights for this delightful, dynamic, carving.

Kooyoo Peter was born November 30, 1966 (Cape Dorset, Nunavut) He is the son of renowned Inuit artist Ejetsiaq Peter. Kooyoo began carving seriously at the age of 18, although he was 13 when he first tried carving a seal.  He learned everything about this art from his late brother Joanasie, who asked him to sculpt alongside him. Realizing that Kooyoo had potential, Joanasie taught him the basics of stone carving, including how to use the ax as well as the file, and which part of the stone to remove first. Kooyoo’s favourite subjects for sculpture are bears, Inuit in action, and shaman transformations. His pieces are strong, well executed and stimulating, while incorporating a sense of movement and refinement quite remarkable and unique to the artist’s style. The work of Kooyoo Peter has been exhibited in galleries in Canada, United States, Germany and Switzerland.

This carving has come to use through a collector who originally purchased this carving directly from the artist.