Birds Around While People Sleep by Lucy Qinnuayuak

$900.00

 

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Artist:                   Lucy Qinnuayuak

Community:        Cape Dorset

Year:                      1982

Media:                   Lithograph, 5/50

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Description

Lucy’s work is most recognizable through her depictions of birds. She drew variety of birds in various poses, usually juxtaposing the creatures intertwined with human characteristics. This Birds Around While People Sleep by Lucy Qinnuayuak is a great example of Lucy’s colourful, and surreal style.

 

Lucy Qinnuayuak (1915-1982) was a graphic artist from Kinngait, NU (Cape Dorset). She was one of the first people to begin creating graphic works through the Kinngait Studios in the early 1960s. Qinnuayuak’s images are surreal, colourful and frequently light-hearted in tone. Her drawings of families, traditional camp life and birds were featured in nearly every Cape Dorset Annual Print Collection from 1961 to 1982. Qinnuayuak’s works have been widely exhibited and are held in numerous major artistic institutions, including the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa, ON and the Winnipeg Art Gallery in Winnipeg, MB.

This Lithograph ” Birds Around While People Sleep by Lucy Qinnuayuak ” is a unique opportunity to acquire an iconic Cape Dorset Print Maker.

Additional information

Weight 0.5 kg
Dimensions 22.25 × 30.5 in

Biography Lucy Qinnuayuak

Lucy Qinnuayuak

ᓗᓯ ᑭᓐᐅᐊᔪᐊ

Lucy Qinnuayuak

Medium: DRAWING, PAINTING, PRINTMAKING

Artistic Community: Kinngait (Cape Dorset), NU

Date of Birth:
Salluit, Nunavik, QC
1915

Date of Death:
1982

Cape Dorset; disc number E7-1068

Lucy Qinnuayuak (1915-1982) was a graphic artist from Kinngait, NU (Cape Dorset). She was born in an outpost camp near Salluit, Nunavik and moved to South Baffin Island with her family at a young age [1]. Qinnuayuak began drawing etchings in the 1950s while living at Supujuak camp and would bring her drawings to James Houston to appraise during resupply trips to Kinngait [2]. In the early 1960s she settled in Kinngait and began participating in the printmaking program [3].

Qinnuayuak was one of the first people to begin creating graphic works through the Kinngait Studios. Her early works were stonecut, in keeping with contemporary printmaking techniques at the time. Towards the end of her artistic practice in the late 1970s Qinnuayuak was introduced to acrylic paints and began creating mixed media works [4]. Her method of painting was to use broad, fluid strokes to create backgrounds and figure outlines, adding details with felt tipped pen and coloured pencil overtop [5]. The print Bird Fantasy (1977-78), composed with felt pen, crayon and acrylic, is an example of Qinnuayuak’s approach to combining mediums [6]. Lithographs of her drawings also appeared around the same time that Qinnuayuak began using acrylics. Her drawing Opiit (Group of Owls) (1976) was one of the first lithographs included in the Cape Dorset Annual Print Collection [7]. Despite the advent of paints and lithography Qinnuayuak preferred to keep her compositions on a white background, rarely depicting landscapes.

Qinnuayuak’s images are surreal, colourful and frequently light-hearted in tone. She often illustrated lively compositions of families, traditional camp activities and community gatherings. Her most recognizable works are her depictions of birds. Owls were a common motif. Her earlier birds are identifiable as gulls, owls and geese, defined by bold outlines and formalized bodies. Over time the shapes of her birds became amorphous and surreal, their bodies dense with colourful patterns, as in her print Owls of Baffin (1982).

Qinnuayuak’s works have been widely exhibited and were featured in nearly every Cape Dorset Annual Print Collection from 1961 to 1982. She was one of ten artists to have her design selected for the banner of the 1976 Montreal Summer Olympics, which was displayed at the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto, ON [8]. In 1984 the stonecut of her print Large Bear (1961) was donated to the Tate Gallery in London, UK and was later put on display at the Scott Polar Research Institute in Cambridge, UK [9]. Her work Untitled Drawing (Owl and People) (1975) was featured on the cover of the Summer 2004 issue of the Inuit Art Quarterly [10]. Most recently, a stonecut of her print Spectator Birds (1970) was featured in the exhibition Maanngat (From Here) (Nov 2016-Feb 2017) at the Drake Hotel in Toronto, ON [11]. Her works are held in numerous major artistic institutions, including the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa, ON and the Winnipeg Art Gallery in Winnipeg, MB.

———-

Accomplishments

1976: Qinnuayuak’s design for the Montreal Summer Olympics banner was one of ten submissions to be selected.

1972: Qinnuayuak’s print Sun Bird (1969) was reproduced on a UNICEF card.

PUBLICATIONS

Rare Cape Dorset textiles find their way to trendy Toronto hotel January 27, 2017 Sarah Rogers

Terry Ryan: A Visionary with a Pragmatic Edge Part Two: Hugging the Curving Shore Summer 2009 Patricia Feheley

Charles Gimpel: Early Promotion of Inuit Art in Europe Spring 2009 Judy Hall

EXHIBITIONS

ᖃᓪᓗᓈᖅᑕᐃᑦ ᓯᑯᓯᓛᕐᒥᑦ PRINTED TEXTILES FROM KINNGAIT STUDIOS December 7, 2019 to August 30, 2020 The Textile Museum of Canada

Maanngat (From Here) Nov 2016 – Feb 2017 The Drake Hotel

Modern Vision: Inuit Masterworks from the 1960s and 1970s June-July 2012 Marion Scott Gallery

ACHIEVEMENTS

Cover of the Inuit Art Quarterly Summer 2004 Inuit Art Foundation

Cape Dorset Annual Print Collection 1983 Dorset Fine Arts

Cape Dorset Annual Print Collection
1982 Dorset Fine Arts

PUBLIC COLLECTIONS

Agnes Etherington Art Centre, Queen’s University Kingston, ON, Canada

Art Gallery of Guelph Guelph, ON, Canada

Art Gallery of Windsor Windsor, ON, Canada

EDIT HISTORY

February 20, 2018 Created by: Rebecca Gray. Inuit Art Foundation

Citations/Footnotes
1. Dorset Fine Arts, “Lucy Qinnuayuak” (Biography, Toronto, ON: accessed February 23, 2018), 1.
2. “Lucy Qinnuayuak,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, accessed February 23, 2018. http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/lucy-qinnuayuak/.
3. Dorset Fine Arts, “Lucy Qinnuayuak,” 1.
4. Ibid.
5. Christine Lalonde, “Artists in the Arctic,” Inuit Art Quarterly 18, no. 3 (Fall 2003): 41.
6. Janet Catherine Berlo, “An Exhibition, A Book and An Exaggerated Reaction,” Inuit Art Quarterly 10, no. 1 (Spring 1995): 28.
7. Jean Blodgett, In Cape Dorset We Do It This Way: Three Decades of Inuit Printmaking (Kleinburg, ON: McMichael Canadian Art Collection, 1991): 92.
8. Dorset Fine Arts, “Lucy Qinnuayuak,” 15.
9. Ibid, 16.
10. Inuit Art Foundation, “Untitled Drawing (Owl and People) (1975) ,” Inuit Art Quarterly 19, no. 2 (Summer 2004): Cover.
11. “Past Exhibits: Maanngat (From Here),” The Drake Hotel, accessed February 23, 2018. http://www.thedrakehotel.ca/culture/mz-maanga-here/.

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