The Canada Auction | June 4 - 9, 2022

The Canada Auction JUNE 4-9, 2022

AUCTION STARTS Saturday, June 4 at 9am ET AUCTION ENDS Thursday, June 9 at 8pm ET BID AND VIEW ALL LOTS ONLINE AT www.waddingtons.ca

INUIT ART 416-847-6191 inuitart@waddingtons.ca SENIOR SPECIALIST Duncan McLean SPECIALIST Palmer Jarvis

Absentee bidding available upon request.

CONSIGNMENT COORDINATOR Elizabeth Gagnon

All lots including additional images, essays and reports can be viewed online at www.waddingtons.ca

CANADIAN FINE ART 416-504-5100 canadianart@waddingtons.ca

IMPORTANT NOTE We are pleased to provide in-person previews for this auction.

Please visit our website for confirmation of dates and times.

COVER Lot 59 PIERRE KARLIK ROYAL COAT OF ARMS OF CANADA BACK COVER Lot 83 JESSIE OONARK UNTITLED (FIGURE WITH FACES) OPPOSITE Lot 32 FRANKLIN CARMICHAEL JULY, 1939 (detail)

SENIOR SPECIALIST Gregory Humeniuk CONSIGNMENT SPECIALIST Kendra Popelas

Waddington’s 275 King Street East, 2nd Floor Toronto, Ontario M5A 1K2 1-877-504-5700 416-504-9100

This auction is subject to the Conditions of Sale printed in the back of this catalogue.

This catalogue and its contents © 2022 Waddington McLean and Company Ltd. All rights reserved.

Photography and design by Waddington’s.

Waddington’s is excited to introduce a new offering to our calendar – The Canada Auction.

This auction brings together the best of Canada, doing away with barriers of genre or style, instead focusing on quality, interest, and significance. The auction presents important Canadian historical and contemporary art and design, alongside cultural artifacts, and exceptional works of Inuit and First Nations art.

An important group of works representing all seven members of the ‘Professional Native Indian Artists Incorporation’ (PNIAI), sometimes called ‘The Indigenous Group of Seven’, are also featured in the auction. These fresh-to-market works by Daphne Odjig, Alex Janvier, Jackson Beardy, Norval Morrisseau, Eddy Cobiness, Carl Ray and Joseph Sánchez are an initial offering from an important Ontario collection.

Exceptional Inuit art includes a monumental sculpture by Manasie Akpiliakpik, two Waddington’s, with our diversity of knowledge examples of nivingajuliat (wallhangings) and areas of expertise, is the ideal home for

by Jessie Oonark, a Migration Boat by this initiative, as it has become increasingly JoeTalirunili, sculpture by masters of classic evident that our clients’ interests are not minimalism John Tiktak, Andy Miki, and John always divided into discrete departments.

Pangnark, a wonderfully detailed work by The work adorning our catalogue cover is both Ennutisak, and a characteristically eccentric an ideal example and an excellent metaphor figure by Karoo Ashevak. for the auction. The Canadian coat of arms, intricately carved in relief by prominent Inuit Of historical and cultural note is a charming artist Pierre Karlik, was presented to future group of four early Quebec wood caricature prime minister John Turner by Justice William figures by Carl Johan Trygg, a dramatic painting Morrow, an early champion of legal and documenting an episode in the history of the illcultural causes of the Inuit. Worlds intersect, fated sailing barque Birnam Wood, and even a united by the power of art and those who 19th Century Quebec wrought iron and painted appreciate it. wood equine-form tobacco cutter!

The auction features works by celebrated Canadian artists including A.Y. Jackson’s vibrant view of St. Urbain, Quebec in sunlight; a bright sketch of clouds by Franklin Carmichael; a long-lost London, U.K. ‘thrift store find’ by Henri Beau; alongside works by Jack Bush, P.C. Shephard, Joe Fafard, John Meredith, W.J. Phillips, and more.

OPPOSITE: ALEX JANVIER, SOUTHERN DENESULINE (DETAIL)

We hope you enjoy this fresh approach to the spring auction season as much as we have enjoyed assembling it.

Duncan McLean President

tWALTER JOSEPH PHILLIPS Walter J. Phillips is one of Canada’s most distinguished graphic artists and is considered the master of colour woodblock printing in Canada. Lake of the Woods, with its villages and varied landscapes, served as muse across all of Phillips’ chosen mediums and inspired his greatest production. He created 11 etchings, 40 woodblocks, five engravings, and innumerable watercolours inspired by Lake of the Woods. Norman Bay, Lake of the Woods and Winnipeg River, Lake of the Woods demonstrate Phillips’ mastery of the English watercolour style. It was a common practice for Phillips to develop a woodcut design from a watercolour, as is the case with both of these paintings.

Sophie Lavoie is a curator and art consultant, with a specialty in the works of Walter J. Phillips. She is the curator of The Muse: Douglas Family Art Centre in Kenora, Ontario.

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1 WALTER JOSEPH PHILLIPS, R.C.A. (1884-1963) A walk down the railroad tracks from Norman Bay took Phillips to the mouth of the Winnipeg River. He later WINNIPEG RIVER, LAKE OF THE WOODS, 1916 turned this watercolour composition into the etching watercolour on card The Backwater (1917). Phillips’ introduction to printing signed and dated was through the etching medium (1915). His works were 16 ins x 20 ins; 40.6 cms x 50.8 cms produced in very limited quantities and he ultimately abandoned the etching process in 1918, resulting in PROVENANCE: the rarity of these works. Phillips was influenced by a Private collection, Washington Japanese aesthetic which favoured a dominant element $12,000–16,000 of flora in the foreground of many of his woodcut compositions. The arching pine branch of this watercolour reappears in Phillips’ woodcut Morning (1924).

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2 WALTER JOSEPH PHILLIPS, R.C.A. (1884-1963) NORMAN BAY, LAKE OF THE WOODS, 1916 watercolour on card signed and dated 13 ins x 15.25 ins; 33 cms x 38.7 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Washington $10,000–15,000

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Phillips stayed in Norman Bay his first few years visiting “the lake.” This piece captures Phillips’ love of nature and expression of beauty. From this painting Phillips reused the foreground with its wild roses and grass growing through the granite for the woodcut Norman Bay, Lake of the Woods (1920). Norman Bay’s defining shoreline reappears in the woodcut print Norman Bay No. 2 (1923) for which he received international recognition in 1924, winning the Storrow Prize at the International Exhibition of Prints in Los Angeles. Phillips’ piece stood apart for his innovative use of local pine wood in addition to the traditional use of cherry. The natural lines of the pine grain mimicked perfectly the wave action along the lakeshore and earned Phillips worldwide praise.

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t JOHN LITTLE Little painted rue de Bullion several times during his career. Named for Angélique de Bullion, a Paris-born philanthropist influential in the foundation of Montreal, the street runs through the Plateau-Mont-Royal neighbourhood.

Many of the subjects Little painted were slated for demolition, and the assault on Montreal’s traditional architecture was a central preoccupation for the artist.

Much of his work attempts to chronicle the city’s urban heritage before it disappears, seen by Little as an architectural “family album.” However, in the case of this urban scene, the buildings it depicts appear to be extant: located at 4017 and 4013 rue de Bullion, facing towards rue Napoleon—give or take a few trees.

It is also worth noting that someone—perhaps the artist—has written out the entire roster of the 1935 minor league baseball team the Montreal Royals on the stretcher bars on the verso, right down to the bat boy. The Royals are perhaps best known for having fielded Jackie Robinson for the 1946 season.

It is a mystery as to why Little wrote down this detailed list of names, as the location of Delorimier Downs, where the team played, is in the Ville Marie neighbourhood—a fair distance away. One wonders if one of the players lived on rue de Bullion, or the subject was top of mind while Little was painting— perhaps a game of memory?

Click here to see the street view

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3 JOHN LITTLE, R.C.A (b. 1928) RUE DE BULLION, MTL, 1981 oil on canvas, signed; signed, titled and dated ‘81 to stretcher; also titled and dated to gallery label on the reverse 24 ins x 30 ins; 61 cms x 76.2 cms PROVENANCE:

Kastel Gallery Inc., Montreal, QC; Private collection, Montreal, QC $15,000—20,000

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NOTE:

The artist inscribed the entire roster of the 1935 Montreal Royals on the reverse. Transcription below: MANAGER FRANK ‘SHAG’ SHAUGHNESSY BILL O’BRIEN trainer ARTHUR NORMANDIN BUSINESS MGR. - MONTREAL ROYALS 1935 - INTERNATIONAL LEAGUE CHAMPS - HECTOR RACINE PRES. Pete Appleton Curly Ogden - RAY Fritz, Leon Chagnon, Chad Kimsey, Hal King. Harry Smythe. GUY MORGAN CONTROLLER - Lauri Myllykangas, Buddy LEWIS, Billy Rhiel, Bob Seeds, Eddie Montagu [sic], Fresco Thompson, Jimmy Ripple, Del Bissonette, Glen [sic] Chapman, Benny Tate, George Granger, Ben Sankey, Gus Dugas. Larry O’Brien, bat boy.

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tJOE NORRIS This fine, early Nova Scotia seascape by Joe Norris was acquired from Toronto’s Mira Godard Gallery by its astute and distinguished collector when Norris’s and Maud Lewis’ work was collected as part of a vogue for folk art in the 1970s and early 1980s. As always, time and the intervening decades helped separate the wheat from the chaff. The artists’ works assumed a larger place in the history of Canadian representational painting while losing none of the directness and singularity that first distinguished them to discerning collectors.

The accomplishment and significance of Two Schooners at Sea is underlined by its history in a collection that also included major image-based works by Greg Curnoe and Lynn Donoghue, and abstractions

by Charles Gagnon. Notwithstanding that, Two Schooners at Sea is successful because of its direct harmony. The image of the schooners, the briny sea and whitecaps, gulls, rocks, and lighthouse evoke Nova Scotia and Atlantic Canada as a state of mind more than as a description of a place. Two Schooners at Sea is a complete ensemble in its painted frame decorated by the artist and with its size and scale has the boldness of few contemporary works.

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4 JOE NORRIS (1924-1996) TWO SCHOONERS AT SEA, 1980 oil on board signed; titled and dated to gallery label on the reverse 42 ins x 23 ins; 106.7 cms x 58.4 cms PROVENANCE:

Mira Godard Gallery, Toronto, ON; Private collection, Montreal, QC $6,000–8,000

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tJACK HAMILTON BUSH Painted at the beginning of Bush’s association with the Painters Eleven—the group having formed the same year, 1953—Sailboats is an excellent example of the artist’s earliest forays into abstraction. This year in the artist’s life was pivotal, also marking a key encounter with seminal American art critic Clement Greenberg, which would alter his artistic path from then on. It was Greenberg who would suggest that Bush try experimenting with different techniques, nudging him into the direction for which he would become known, and away from his Abstract Expressionist style. Inspired by his watercolour sketches, Bush began simplifying his compositions by using thinly applied washes of colour. Sailboats is thus an example of this foundational form.

During this period, Bush used his feelings as the foundation of his art, attempting to communicate with the viewer through emotion and abstraction— less concerned with literal depictions than with essences.

Bush would not turn to painting full-time until 1968, instead leaning on a paycheck from his job as a commercial illustrator. His artmaking was of significant importance to him, providing escape and relief from his workaday troubles. Even his therapist of 30 years, J. Allan Walters, encouraged Bush to explore abstraction as a method of working through various issues in his life. Art historian Ken Carpenter explains, “Bush overcame his suffering in and through his art…He was an artist who was concerned with sentiment but who was never sentimental in his art.”

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5 JACK HAMILTON BUSH (1909-1977) SAILBOATS, LAKE OF BAYS, 1953 watercolour signed and dated 21 ins x 29 ins; 53.3 cms x 73.7 cms PROVENANCE:

Thielsen Galleries, London, ON; Private collection, British Columbia LITERATURE:

Karen Wilkin, Jack Bush, (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart Ltd, 1984) 32 $20,000–30,000

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t ALFRED JOSEPH CASSON Rapids on the Severn River is an elegantly balanced composition that shows the heart of A.J. Casson’s contribution to Canadian art. He began his career as a designer apprenticing to Franklin Carmichael in 1919, studying and sketching diligently, then beginning to exhibit with the Graphic Arts Club in 1921. He became a member of the Group of Seven by 1926 — when he was only 28 years old — and then a founding member of the Canadian Group of Painters in 1933.

It is important to note that Casson’s work ethic was prodigious, and that he remained a designer in addition to his artistic output. One of the key attributes of his art by the time he joined the Group is his facility with composition. This is crucial to understanding his work in general, and in particular for appreciating a work like Rapids on the Severn River. Casson does not evoke a Romantic vision of rapids roiling with foam and danger. Rather, in his calm and considered way, it is his ability to see the design in nature and make it anew on the sheet.

The rapids flow into the composition in a diagonal line from the middle left, down across boulders that make a wedge in the top right. As the water flows down and is calmed by the boulder in the foreground, the tranquil foliage at the top of the composition complements the stable rock in the front. In his grace and precision, Casson’s rapids move like a fine machine.

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6 ALFRED JOSEPH CASSON, O.S.A., P.R.C.A. (1898-1992) RAPIDS ON THE SEVERN RIVER watercolour signed 11 ins x 13.5 ins; 27.9 cms x 34.3 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Ontario $15,000–20,000

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7 ALFRED JOSEPH CASSON, O.S.A., P.R.C.A. (1898-1992) SASKATCHEWAN FARM HOUSE watercolour signed sight 14 ins x 15.5 ins; 35.6 cms x 39.4 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Ontario $15,000–20,000

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A.J. Casson’s affection and fascination for rural vernacular architecture is as integral to the body of Canadian landscape painting as A.Y. Jackson’s affection and fascination for Quebec’s Charlevoix region. Saskatchewan Farm House is a refined composition, almost crystalline in its rendering of the farmhouse and buildings on the crest of a hillock. More of a studio composition than one done en plein air, Casson’s careful delineation of the foreground field with fence, the middleground of barren trees and buildings, and the elevated background of the late winter clouds foster serenity.

Casson’s serenity is always inhabited and humane. In contrast, the foreboding quality Lawren S. Harris’s structures sometimes possess is absent, and where Harris’s overcast skies may suggest gloom, Casson’s vaporous air is only calming. As the snow is beginning to melt and bare patches appear on the ground, the quiet farm house is active with Casson’s delicate little compositions: one window’s blind halfway up with drapes open, the other three-quarters up with drapes mostly closed–as the inhabitants go about their lives.

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tDAVID LLOYD BLACKWOOD Blackwood’s hometown of Wesleyville was once an important outpost for fishing and sealing enterprises.

Poor farming conditions in Newfoundland meant that residents relied on the ocean’s bounty for survival, travelling to the rich northern waters off the Labrador coast in the brief summer months. Wesleyville was close to these abundant fishing grounds, and the local geography played host to large schooners and custombuilt facilities designed to cure the Labrador catch. The majority of the men in the community would depart annually for Labrador, returning with a ship full of fish.

Once they had returned, the local women and children would clean and dry the fish for export.

Blackwood’s grandfather and father were both noted ship’s captains. The artist recalls: “my father started going to the Labrador when he was only ten. By the time he was seventeen, he took charge of a schooner under the watchful eye of a relative who was all of forty! But no problems developed, and he carried on. My father had a tremendous fear of the ocean–which is another way of saying he had tremendous respect for it.”

In Outward Bound for the Labrador, the artist deliberately includes the Arctic icefields, noting that the captains aboard these vessels “were navigating through all that [ice], against the wind and tides, so there is no doubt that they were to become great ice navigators.

Admiral Perry depended on those same men to take them to the South Pole and the North Pole.”

Gary Michael Dault, “An Interview with David Blackwood.” Black Ice: David Blackwood Prints of Newfoundland, ed. Katharine Lochnan.

(Vancouver: Art Gallery of Ontario, Douglas & McIntyre, 2011), 34-36.

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8 DAVID LLOYD BLACKWOOD, O.S.A., R.C.A. (b. 1941) OUTWARD BOUND FOR THE LABRADOR, 1985 etching and aquatint on paper signed, titled, numbered H/C and dated 15 ins x 34.75 ins; 38.1 cms x 88.3 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Stittsville, ON $4,000–6,000

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tMARC-AURÈLE FORTIN Painted during one of Fortin’s excursions to the Gaspésie region of Quebec during 1941-1945, this work presents a typical view of the Gaspé coast.

Composed in a predominantly cool-toned palette, the canvas is split between the village with rolling hills and an intense, yet majestic sky. Art historian Francois-Marc Gagnon discusses the paradox of Fortin’s skies, stating that they “...dominate the city like a threatening storm [yet] at the same time, the sky is glorious.”

This glorious sky was achieved through watercolour painting, a medium Fortin favoured during these trips: he would often travel by bicycle, finding his watercolour materials easier to carry than oil paint.

Michèle Grandbois, Marc-Aurele Fortin, The Experience of Colour, (Quebec: Musée national des beaux-arts du Quebec, 2010), 155.

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9 MARC-AURÈLE FORTIN, R.C.A. (1888-1970) GRANDE RIVIÈRE, GASPÉSIE, CIRCA 1943 watercolour signed; titled and dated to letter from the artist’s Estate on the reverse 22 ins x 28 ins; 55.9 cms x 71.1 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON $15,000–20,000

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10 MARC-AURÈLE FORTIN, R.C.A. (1888-1970) A charming village scene by Fortin that vibrantly evokes feelings of small-town life, this painting has a warmth to it, VILLAGE CANADIEN with amber lights glowing from the house windows, and warm watercolour hues found in the leaves of the tree, suggesting the season of signed; titled to gallery label on the reverse autumn.

22 ins x 28 ins; 55.9 cms x 71.1 cms PROVENANCE:

Walter Klinkhoff Gallery, Montreal, QC; Private collection, Montreal, QC $15,000–20,000

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Village Canadien was painted with a technique by the artist often referred to as “Black Manner” — a period that began in 1934 where Fortin would paint over dark surfaces to create dynamic coloured planes. This technique achieves a high-contrast colour palette, and tips the work ever so slightly into the realm of abstraction.

Michèle Grandbois, Marc-Aurèle Fortin, The Experience of Colour, (Quebec: Musée national des beaux-arts du Quebec, 2010), 120.

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tPAUL PEEL In the last quarter of the nineteenth century ambitious artists went to Paris. More than ambitious, Paul Peel was also astute, talented, and went there in 1881 after studying at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts (PAFA) in Philadelphia from 1877 to 1880, where his instructors included Thomas Eakins.

Before taking up residence in Paris, Peel spent part of the spring of 1881 at the American artists’ colony in Brittany at Pont-Aven. Early in 1882, while studying in the atelier of JeanLéon Gérôme, Peel was elected an Associate of the Royal Canadian Academy in whose annual exhibition he showed The Spinner (1882), now in the collection of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. He returned to Pont-Aven that summer and again in 1884, the year of this painting. The paintings he exhibited at the RCA and the Paris Salons are known for their endearing portrayals of childhood and maternal care with fine painterly finish, the best known of this type of large figurative painting being his After the Bath (1890) in the collection of the Art Gallery of Ontario.

Concurrent with these major studio paintings of figures, Peel painted smaller landscapes of which this limpid view of Pont-Aven is quintessential. These paintings strike a different note from Peel’s Salon paintings in their careful attention to atmosphere, architecture, and people. For some they evoke Impressionist painting through their glorious light and calm.

They also owe a debt to Peel’s PAFA teacher Thomas Eakins, whose refined and sensitive portrayal of the interplay of light, water and air in his stellar, The Champion Single Sculls (Max Schmitt in a Single Scull) (1871) in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Starting Out After Rail (1874) in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, resonate in this view of Pont-Aven.

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11 PAUL PEEL, R.C.A. (1860-1892) UNTITLED, 1884 oil on canvas signed and dated; inscribed “Paul Peel” to stretcher on the reverse 16 ins x 12.75 ins; 40.6 cms x 32.4 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Germany $6,000–8,000

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tHENRI BEAU Henri Beau is far too little known in English Canada.

Born in Montreal in 1863, he left Canada for France in 1888, where he developed and maintained a career until his death in 1949. He exhibited less in Canada than in France, where he often showed with the Société des artistes indépendants. Fortunately for Beau and the study of Canadian art, recent scholarship on Canadian Impressionism by A. K. Prakash and by the National Gallery of Canada for its internationally touring exhibition, “Canada and Impressionism: New Horizons”, 1880-1930, has helped rewrite Beau into the history of Canadian art.

Probably painted in the middle 1920s in Normandy, most likely around Rouen or downriver near the mouth of the Seine at Honfleur, Untitled is a beautiful Impressionist painting redolent of the twentieth-century paintings of Claude Monet. Monet’s vaporous blue and mauveinfused views of London and Venice, and late yellow and green views of his garden at Giverny, are here sensitively coalesced by Beau.

Fresh to the market, the painting’s provenance is nearly as compelling as the artwork itself. Acquired at a thrift shop in London, England in 2017, the painting plausibly belonged to the actor John Vere Biggar (1915-1961) whose father, Henry Percival Biggar (1872-1938), was the chief Archivist for the Public Archives of Canada, and worked with Beau in France. Untitled is in an extraordinary state of preservation. Unvarnished and unlined, it has the unique texture and original freshness Impressionist masters like Monet and Claude Pissarro wanted for their paintings, which too often were sullied by varnish after they left their studios.

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12 HENRI BEAU UNTITLED oil on canvas signed 21.12 ins x 28.25 ins; 53.6 cms x 71.8 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, London, UK $4,000–6,000

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tJOSEPH YVON FAFARD Fafard’s ceramic lampscapes were made in the early 1980s, and Friendly Intruder, which is populated with beavers and a moose, is an excellent example from this significant body of work. When asked in 1987 about his lampscapes, Fafard said, “There are very few landscapes done in sculpture that can be called sculpture…I wanted to make an object with very little surface but with a great illusion of depth in terms of space.” There is an in/out tension with these lamps. When turned off, you are drawn into the dark thicket, visually grasping for a narrative populated with Canadian beasts. Thanks to Fafard’s masterful use of a lustred background, when the bulb is switched on, a warm light unexpectedly emanates out into the domestic space, expanding the presence of the sculpture beyond its form. Attesting to the importance of the lampscapes, several are found in private collections around the world and one, Moose in Lampscape, 1983, is in the collection of the Moose Jaw Museum & Art Gallery.

We invite you to read more about this work on our blog.

Julia Krueger maintains an active writing, curatorial and research practice grounded in material culture and craft theory. She is currently the Permanent Collection Registrar with SK Arts. Krueger has taught art history courses at the University of Western Ontario, Luther College, University of Regina and Alberta College of Art + Design.

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13 JOSEPH YVON FAFARD, R.C.A. (1942-2019) FRIENDLY INTRUDER, 1983 ceramic lamp signed, titled and dated “March 1983” 15.25 ins x 14.5 ins x 10.5 ins; 38.7 cms x 36.8 cms x 26.7 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Montreal, QC $10,000–15,000

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tBARKER FAIRLEY Delightfully spare, Fairley reduces the cropped rural landscape into something even more elemental and economical. Of the artist’s landscapes, former “Toronto Star” art critic Gary Michael Dault writes that “the leanness and severity of their composition is radical and the radiant colour that flows from each of them is irresistible.” He notes that “for most of us a tree is only a tree. For Barker—in his paintings at least—a tree is a living twist of energy that holds the sky up off the surface of the earth.” 1 1 Gary Michael Dault, Barker Fairley: Portraits.

(Toronto: Methuen, 1981), xv-xvi.

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14 BARKER FAIRLEY, R.C.A. (1887-1986) BLACK APPLETREE, 1970 oil on Masonite signed; signed, titled, dated and inscribed “finished 1970 from sketch of about 1965” on the reverse 20 ins x 24 ins; 50.8 cms x 61 cms PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist; Private collection, Toronto, ON $3,000–5,000

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tOTTO ROGERS Acclaimed art critic Clement Greenberg found inspiration in Otto Rogers’ work, acknowledging him as a ‘big-attack’ painter in his 1963 review. Followers of Greenberg frequently visited Rogers’ studio, along with other Saskatchewan artists who were members of the Emma Lake Workshops. Rogers was praised by critics for his ability to balance representation and abstraction in his painting while maintaining his roots in the prairie landscape.

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15 OTTO DONALD ROGERS, R.C.A. (1935-2019) Iceland 10 is a strong example of Rogers’ dedication to landscape painting. Created during his three-month ICELAND 10, 1971 trip to Iceland in 1971, this work has a peaceful and acrylic on canvas contemplative presence in its muted palette and signed, titled and dated ‘71 on the reverse composition. Professor Ken Carpenter describes 43.5 ins x 43.5 ins; 110.5 cms x 110.5 cms Rogers’ placement of forms as “...unsettling, strangely angled, awkward, unbalanced, isolated even, yet PROVENANCE: eventually they resolve into a meditative and uplifting Private collection, Toronto, ON calm.” $7,000–9,000

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16 OTTO DONALD ROGERS, R.C.A. (1935-2019) HYACINTHS AND CERTITUDE, 1982 acrylic on canvas signed, titled and dated ‘82 on the reverse; also titled to gallery labels on the reverse 60 ins x 60 ins; 152.4 cms x 152.4 cms PROVENANCE:

Mira Godard Gallery, Toronto, ON; Bau-Xi Gallery, Toronto, ON; Private collection, Calgary, AB $8,000–10,000

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Of a Cubist-Constructivist style, Hyacinths and Certitude presents a darker colour palette with depth and texture. The title references a scripture from the Baha’i faith, of which Rogers was a practitioner: Then did His clouds part and loaded down the earth with His bounties and bestowals, and made all things sweet with rain, and caused the fresh greenery of knowledge and the hyacinths of certitude to spring forth and to shake and tremble for joy, till the whole world was scented with the fragrance of His holiness.

Spirituality is the common vein that runs throughout Rogers’ work, and is what sets him apart from his contemporaries. The thought behind his paintings can be linked to philosophers and artists such as Wassily Kandinsky, Lawren Harris and Barnett Newman.

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tRITA LETENDRE When Rita Letendre painted Trombe in 1959, she was already regarded in Montreal as a painter of accomplishment and expectation. After leaving Montreal’s École des Beaux-Arts in 1948, frustrated with its attitudes and teaching, Letendre discovered Paul-Émile Borduas and the Automatistes, and made a personal commitment to paint as her metier. She developed quickly and participated in exhibitions organised by Borduas, Claude Gauvreau and Gilles Corbeil. Prodigiously, she had several solo exhibitions by the end of the 1950s, when Robert Ayre complimented her work for becoming firmer and more compact, and the fluency and confidence the work of this period showed.

This is all here in Trombe. Her keen sensitivity to colour and tone give Trombe an intimacy unmatched by some of her peers working on small paintings.

Where theirs can suggest a fragment of a larger painting, hers are self-contained worlds. Trombe is large in scale and its carefully-calibrated white, black, slate blue and greys easily draw one into meditation or reverie. Her pulls of paint evoke Jean Paul Riopelle done with care instead of velocity and further her distinct understanding of Borduas to her own ends.

Letendre’s style was her own, and what she picked up from Borduas most importantly was his example of being completely immersed in the making of each work. This influenced her commitment to paint and to making art for personal self-knowledge.

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17 RITA LETENDRE, R.C.A. (1928-2021) TROMBE, 1959 oil on canvas signed and dated ‘59 13 ins x 11 ins; 33 cms x 27.9 cms PROVENANCE:

Canadian Fine Arts Gallery, Toronto, ON; Mayberry Fine Art, Toronto, ON; Private collection, British Columbia $20,000–30,000

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tLISE GERVAIS Gervais had met Borduas and Riopelle in Europe, and while she was not a signatory of their Automatiste manifesto Refus Global—being but 15 when it was published—her spontaneous approach, strongly held ideals and use of specific formal elements hold echoes of their work.

Using thick, minimally blended fields of paint applied with a palette knife or spatula, Gervais’ signature style is weighty, concerned with the materiality of her medium. Untitled perfectly showcases the chromatic purity of the artist’s works. So vivid is the canvas when viewed in person that it gives the impression that it was painted recently.

Viewing Gervais’ paintings in 1964, Dorothy Pfeiffer, the Montreal Gazette’s art critic, wrote that “…in spite of the amount in pounds of paint laid on her canvases, Gervais manages to suggest dimensions of space, depth, transparency, texture, and movement which are remarkable…colourful, stencil-like, paintings climb like exotic vines, or else soar like flights of birds of paradise. Everything moves, flies, rises, or flaps loudly in Gervais’ paintings. But nothing–absolutely nothing– flutters. In fact, the dominant note in her technique is ‘power,’ a power both authoritative and invigorating.” 1 1 A Dictionary of Canadian Artists, Volume II, ed. Colin S. MacDonald, (Ottawa: Canadian Paperbacks Publishing Ltd., 1979).

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67

18 LISE GERVAIS (1933-1998) UNTITLED, 1975 oil on canvas signed and dated ‘75 36 ins x 36 ins; 91.4 cms x 91.4 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Montreal, QC $15,000–20,000

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69

t MARCELLA MALTAIS In 1958, Maltais achieved her lifelong dream of moving to Paris. She was then introduced to other abstract artists including Alberto Giacometti and Yves Klein. Since Maltais did not have a studio in Paris, she produced small-scale canvases, drawings and collages. This work was painted that same year.

An important contributor to the history of Canadian Abstraction, Maltais was closely aligned with the Automatiste painters. Her work was included in the Paris Biennial in 1964, the Musée d’Art Contemporain in Montreal in 1965 as well as several international shows in Czechoslovakia, Italy and New York City. Maltais maintained residences and studios at Hydra, Greece and Quebec City.

VIEW THIS LOT 70 The Canada Auction

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71

19 MARCELLA MALTAIS (1933-2018) UNTITLED, 1958 oil on canvas signed and dated ‘58 30 ins x 14 ins; 76.2 cms x 35.6 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON $6,000–8,000

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73

t ARMAND VAILLANCOURT Collision was conceived in 1987 and cast in 1990.

Keen-eyed collectors should note the mark between “1990” and “Vaillancourt” is the logo of the foundry, an F combined with an A for Fonderie d’Art. There are four sculptures in the edition, one of which is held in the collection of the Musée Laurier in Victoriaville, Quebec.

Vaillancourt is well known for his exploratory methods with respect to the various media he works with. The artist developed an original method of casting his abstract bronze sculptures in the late 1950s, which involved the use of styrofoam and other inflammable soft plastics. Vaillancourt utilised the styrofoam as a mould, which he would pack in sand before filling with molten metal. As evidenced here, a subtle imprint from the styrofoam would be left behind, stippling the surface of the sculpture’s dramatic form.

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75

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20 ARMAND VAILLANCOURT (b. 1932) COLLISION, 1987 bronze signed, titled, dated and numbered 3/4 9 ins x 6 ins x 5 ins; 22.9 cms x 15.2 cms x 12.7 cms PROVENANCE:

Gift of the artist; Private collection, Montreal, QC $4,500–6,000

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77

tPAUL VANIER BEAULIEU Paul Vanier Beaulieu is another artist underrecognized in English Canada. He studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in Montreal, where he met Stanley Cosgrove and Jean-Paul Lemieux, then worked to save money to travel to Paris in 1938, a year after he graduated. Beaulieu soon established himself in Paris by acquiring a studio in Montparnasse, taking classes at the École des Beaux-Arts while making work. After a brief return to Canada following the Second World War, he went back to Paris and kept it as his base until his permanent return to Canada in 1973.

Beaulieu was primarily painting the figure and still life in Paris in the late 1940s and 1950s. These massive grapes embody the essence of the School of Paris post-war. Beaulieu was a participant in this milieu, no longer a student, and measured himself among a rising wave of modernists such as Nicolas de Staël.

Raisins is an essay on volumes, planes of colour and space that never wavers from its connection to the perceived world, grounded in the spirit of French modernism in the post-war era.

VIEW THIS LOT 78 The Canada Auction

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79

21 PAUL VANIER BEAULIEU, R.C.A. (1910-1996) RAISINS, 1959 oil on canvas signed and dated ‘59; titled to gallery label on the reverse 21.25 ins x 32 ins; 54 cms x 81.3 cms PROVENANCE:

Dominion Gallery, Montreal, QC; Collection of Dr. and Mrs. Max Stern, Montreal, QC; Beaverbrook Art Gallery, Fredericton, NB Deaccessioned to benefit art purchases at the Beaverbrook Art Gallery $8,000–12,000

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81

t FRITZ BRANDTNER Fritz Brandtner was a trailblazer for abstraction in Canada. Having immigrated from Germany to Winnipeg in 1928, Brandtner brought the ideas of the German Expressionists to Western and Central Canada and was the first artist to exhibit abstract art in Montreal in 1936.

Masterfully composed with encaustic paint and string, this painting demonstrates Brandtner’s commitment to experimentation. String as a medium fascinated Brandtner, and he looked at it through a theoretical lens. In one of Brandtner’s journals, now housed in the Fritz Brandtner Library at the National Gallery of Canada, Brandtner writes: “five minutes of honest relaxation playing with brush and paper or a piece of wire or a piece of string can be a better therapy [than] any psychiatrists can prescribe.”

VIEW THIS LOT 82 The Canada Auction

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83

22 FRITZ BRANDTNER (1896-1969) UNTITLED, CIRCA 1965 encaustic and string on board signed 27.25 ins x 27.75 ins; 69.2 cms x 70.5 cms PROVENANCE:

Fraser Bros. Ltd. Auctioneers, Montreal, QC, Sept. 1975; Private collection, Montreal, QC $4,000–6,000

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85

tJEAN ALBERT MCEWEN Produced during a transformational period in the artist’s oeuvre, Le feu des signes series exhibits McEwen’s adoption of hard-edge painting and acrylic as a medium. This period lasted from 1965-1969 before McEwen returned to oil painting. He was largely inspired by American painters including Frank Stella, Ellsworth Kelly, and Kenneth Noland.

Le feu des signes series was painted at the end of McEwen’s hard-edge period in 1969. That same year he was elected as a member of the Royal Canadian Academy and held a solo exhibition at the Galerie Jolliet in Quebec.

A work from this series, Vert traversant le feu des signes is held in the Contemporary Art collection of the Musée National des Beaux-Arts du Quebec.

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87

23 JEAN ALBERT MCEWEN, R.C.A. (1923-1999) PAYSAGE INACHEVÉ #9, 1989 oil on canvas signed, titled and dated ‘89 on the reverse; also titled and dated to gallery label on the reverse 30 ins x 30 ins; 76.2 cms x 76.2 cms PROVENANCE:

Waddington & Gorce Inc., Toronto, ON; Private collection, Montreal, QC $10,000–15,000

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24 JEAN ALBERT MCEWEN, R.C.A. (1923-1999) LE FEU DES SIGNES TRAVERSÉ PAR UN VERT, NO. 4, 1969 acrylic on canvas signed and dated ‘69; also signed and dated ‘69 to overflap; titled to gallery label on the reverse 12 ins x 12 ins; 30.5 cms x 30.5 cms PROVENANCE:

Galerie Jolliet, Quebec, QC; Private collection, Toronto, ON $6,000–8,000

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89

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91

tLÉON BELLEFLEUR Painted in 1985 when Bellefleur was 75, Fin de Saison embodies the artist’s characteristic style, one that he had been exploring for thirty years: “colours spread liberally with a spatula, with the refinement of rhythms and shades, then as a finishing touch to the improvisation, squirts or droplets are added, or small mysterious signs traced with the tip of the tool.” 1 An exhibition of the artist’s work that year prompted critic Lawrence Sabbath of the Montreal Gazette to note that “if this is what advancing age has in store, artists should look forward with anticipation and hurry to reach that plateau.”2 1 Guy Robert, Bellefleur: The Fervour of the Quest, (Montreal: Iconia, 1988), 63.

2 Robert, 63.

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93

25 LÉON BELLEFLEUR, R.C.A. (1910-2007) FIN DE SAISON, 1985 oil on canvas signed and dated ‘85; signed, titled and dated ‘85 on the reverse; also titled to gallery label on the reverse 12 ins x 14 ins; 30.5 cms x 35.6 cms PROVENANCE:

Galerie Walter Klinkhoff, Montreal, QC; Private collection, Toronto, ON $4,000–6,000 94 The Canada Auction

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95

RENÉ MARCIL t Accompanied by impeccable provenance, Waddington’s presents René Marcil’s Abstract #50, painted in Paris at his studio on rue Séguier, Quai des Grands-Augustins.

While living in Paris, Marcil became a “Montparno,” a name for the artists and intellectuals who were regulars at the Montparnasse cafés and restaurants such as Brasserie La Coupole and La Closerie des Lilas, the latter being Ernest Hemingway’s home café where he wrote regularly for the Toronto Star. At the former, Marcil was in contact with artist Sonia Delaunay.

The Odessa-born Delaunay and her husband Robert were co-founders of the Orphism movement, an offshoot of Cubism. Orphism—a term coined by poet Guillaume Apollinaire—is noted for its use of bold colours and geometric shapes. Delaunay was the first living female artist to have a retrospective exhibition at the Louvre, held in 1964.

Delaunay’s influence can clearly be felt in Abstract #50, both formally and chromatically.

Marcil evolved towards Abstract Geometric and Abstract Figurative creating paintings composed of structured and irregular forms. Using his vivid Fauvist colour palette, Marcil achieved a striking balance between form, colour and space. He would often VIEW THIS LOT 96 The Canada Auction

say, “for me, abstract and figurative are one of the same.’’ Abstract #50 showcases this basic Marcilian structure, but is expanded by the addition of two ovoid shapes, which soften the angular composition. These organic circles are juxtaposed with the sharpness of the other elements, providing visual respite before guiding the eye around the expertly laid out canvas. These circular motifs became a signature for the artist, who included them in many of his most famous works.

Herein lies a clear dialogue with the work of Delaunay.

The Van Diemen-Lilienfeld Galleries, 57th Street at Madison Avenue, New York exhibited Marcil’s work from the mid-1950s until its closure in the mid1960s. Curator Elizabeth Flinn from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, refers to Marcil’s work as ‘’poetic in colour and composition.’’ Artworks

by Marcil were included in a Modern Art group exhibition alongside paintings

by Pollock and Magritte.

Works by Marcil are present in the Collections Nationales de France, Ministère de la Culture de France, Musée des Arts Décoratifs at the Louvre, in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York and in the Sweeney Collection.

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26 RENÉ MARCIL (1917-1993) ABSTRACT #50, 1958 oil on canvas signed, dated ‘58, and inscribed “Paris” 57.5 ins x 44.75 ins; 127.6 cms x 102.2 cms PROVENANCE:

Patrimoine Marcil, Geneva, Switzerland $30,000–50,000

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99

tGUIDO MOLINARI By painting Sans titre in 1953, Molinari beat and bettered American painter Frank Stella to the punch by keeping his paint as good and as pure as it was in the tube. Barely 20 years old, Molinari’s foray signalled an audacity and genius at the outset of a half-century long career. In 1953 Molinari began his determined commitment to paint abstractions, and in Sans titre he extended Paul-Émile Borduas’s exploration of paint as a material with inherent physical properties by taking those properties as given, and advancing from there.

In contrast to Group of Seven artists who by necessity travelled light when working en plein air, Molinari painted in the studio. Unlike Tom Thomson, Peter Clapham Sheppard, or a Group of Seven artist who fashioned their greens with yellow and blue, Molinari would use the best green (or any colour) direct from the tube. This also conferred integrity to each colour he applied and manipulated in his early abstractions.

Sans titre describes nothing, it is an abstraction from nothing, and it does not describe a fictional space in the manners of Wassily Kandinsky, Yves Tanguay, or even Borduas at this time. Each passage of Molinari’s six colours is painted with brushstrokes layered over the other. The colours’ values incite movement into and away from the picture plane in the manner of Hans Hofmann, yet Molinari keeps the viewer’s eyes and mind engaged more deeply.

In size and technique Sans titre is some distance from Molinari’s Mutation paintings of the middle 1960s that resounded strongly in the moments of Op art and Minimalism. In its conception, however, Sans titre shares significantly with the Mutation paintings and is part of Molinari’s vital groundwork. In both cases his confrontation with paint as material, and colour as material with no preconceptions was historic.

This aligns him with his American contemporaries Donald Judd and Dan Flavin who were often crudely–if inaccurately–labelled Minimalists.

VIEW THIS LOT 100 The Canada Auction

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101

27 GUIDO MOLINARI, R.C.A. (1933-2004) SANS TITRE, 1953 oil on canvas signed on the reverse 12 ins x 14 ins; 31.1 cms x 33 cms PROVENANCE:

Mayberry Fine Art, Winnipeg, MB/Toronto, ON; Private collection, Abbotsford, BC $20,000–30,000

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103

t ARTHUR LISMER The artistic careers of the members of the Group of Seven following its dissolution in 1933 present fascinating case studies: Lawren S. Harris pursued abstraction. A.Y. Jackson and Frederick H. Varley maintained their commitments to the subjects they painted prior to and during the Group’s heyday.

Arthur Lismer is conspicuous for his pursuit of new subjects, locales, and painting techniques.

Starfish and Seaweed is a fine example of Lismer’s new lease on artistic life and was exhibited in the 1957 exhibition of the Canadian Group of Painters in Montreal. In contrast to the myth and reality of the Group’s predilection for expansive views of the landscape–something to which Lismer never dogmatically adhered–it is a probing look down into a tidal pool on Vancouver Island where he began vacationing in the early 1950s. It is a study in painting informed by 50 years of experience.

It is impossible to look at Starfish and Seaweed without thinking of Lismer’s absorption of new trends in painting in Montreal where he had been living and teaching since 1940, and the modern painting he saw on trips to New York. Rendered simply, the starfish and float are enlivened and refined by Lismer’s use of the butt-end of his brush to draw through the paint. The seaweed is a glorious melee of purple madder and ultramarine evoking the facture of Marcel Barbeau’s Shoreline (1953) in the National Gallery of Canada, and shows Lismer’s quiet confidence to see new things, be unencumbered by his history, and nurture his evolution.

VIEW THIS LOT 104 The Canada Auction

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105

28 ARTHUR LISMER, O.S.A., R.C.A. (1885-1969) STARFISH AND SEAWEED oil on panel initialed “A.L”; signed and titled on the reverse; also titled to label on the reverse 12 ins x 16 ins; 30.5 cms x 40.6 cms PROVENANCE:

Walker’s Auctions, Ottawa, ON, 5 Dec 2007, lot 118; Private collection, Toronto, ON $14,000–18,000

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107

tALEXANDER YOUNG JACKSON More than his many accomplishments, including his participation in the Canadian War Memorials Fund during the First World War, founding memberships in the Group of Seven (1920), the Beaver Hall Group (1920), and Canadian Group of Painters (1933), and his advocacy for his fellow artists, A.Y. Jackson’s most profound contribution to Canadian culture was changing how Canadians see their country. From east to west and from north to south Jackson painted the country in all seasons, creating images that have become synonymous with the places they depict, even if few Canadians have visited them.

Smart River, Alaska Highway is a brilliant example of this. It is both a sequel to his work with the Canadian War Memorials in 1917-1919 and a contribution to the depiction of the war effort on the domestic front during the Second World War. In October 1943, when he was 62 years old, he and Henry Glyde went up the Alaska Highway to do studies for the National Gallery of Canada. As the highway was still under military control, their movements were circumscribed, yet Jackson’s ability to see potential in the landscape was unimpeded.

This tempera on board composition of the Smart River on the Alaska Highway in far north-western British Columbia, a few kilometres south of the Yukon border, is the original artwork for the serigraph, River, Alaska Highway (Smart River), 1945-1948 published by Sampson-Matthews as part of the Federation of Canadian Artists program of democratising Canadian art by using a new form and distributing it broadly. It displays all of Jackson’s artistic powers. As with his paintings of southern Alberta of the period, in his maturity he understood that painting the deceptively vast distances requires different techniques. Here it is light. Zones of brilliant yellows, near black of silhouetted trees and neutral pale green for snow and ice move the viewer’s eyes into an amazing, silent space in the midst of global conflict.

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109

29 ALEXANDER YOUNG JACKSON, O.S.A., R.C.A. (1882-1974) SMART RIVER, ALASKA HIGHWAY, 1943 tempera on board signed; titled and dated to labels on the reverse 20 ins x 26.5 ins; 50.8 cms x 67.3 cms PROVENANCE:

Joyner Canadian Art, Toronto, ON, 16 May 1990, lot 279; Private collection, Burlington, ON, 1990; By descent to private collection, December 2020 NOTE:

A coloured serigraph based on this subject was produced by Sampson-Matthews. $60,000–80,000

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111

t PETER CLAPHAM SHEPPARD Waddington’s is honoured to offer Edge of Town, Early Spring and its study, Sketch for Edge of Town, Early Spring by Peter Clapham Sheppard as separate lots in The Canada Auction, and give the rare opportunity to view the relationship between sketch and canvas..

The pure pleasure of Edge of Town, Early Spring is rare in Canadian landscape painting of the first half of the twentieth century. Sheppard’s major landscape compositions provide more of this pleasure for two key reasons. One is that his paintings show people in their environments engaged with each other being human and humane. The other is his palette, particularly his use of white to leaven the chroma and give his paintings their distinct luminosity.

The practice of making field studies had been common since the early nineteenth century in England and France, and Sheppard used it to his own ends as much to establish compositions and colour as to experiment.

Sketch for Edge of Town, Early Spring establishes the artist’s and our vantage atop a hill looking across a valley to the edge of a town with bands of rain in the distance. With chrome yellow, ultramarine, purple madder, and white, Sheppard had all he needed to capture the landscape. As with Tom Thomson’s sketches on panel, Sheppard’s intentionally restricted palette gives the sketch an inherent harmony. The multiple tints between yellow, green and puce are all the product of his careful blending on-site and in the moment.

From Sheppard’s first observation to first touches of paint on the panel, the distant rains add to the composition’s psychological atmosphere. It evokes country air, cut hay in the late summer, and builds an emotional connection to the scene. When he worked up the sketch into the canvas, the structure of the composition and the palette remained remarkably consistent. At full exhibition size, Sheppard’s point of view is fully realised.

The bird’s eye perspective of Edge of Town, Early Spring is singular in his œuvre. Sheppard’s elevated perspective elevates our spirit as we see people on the land engaged with it and each other, humane and luminous.

VIEW THIS LOT 112 The Canada Auction

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113

30 PETER CLAPHAM SHEPPARD, O.S.A., R.C.A. (1882-1965) EDGE OF TOWN, EARLY SPRING, 1936 oil on canvas signed; Estate stamp and fragment of Royal Canadian Academy of Arts label on the reverse.

30 ins x 36 ins; 76.2 cms x 91.4 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Ontario

EXHIBITED:

57th Annual Exhibition, Royal Canadian Academy of Arts, Art Gallery of Toronto, 1935, no. 184, as Edge of Town, Early Spring; Royal Canadian Academy Travelling Exhibition, organized for tour by the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, ON 1937-1938; 65th Annual Exhibition, Royal Canadian Academy of Arts, Art Gallery of Toronto, 1944, no. 124, as The Edge of Town; Royal Canadian Academy Travelling Exhibition, organized for tour by the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, ON 1945. $30,000–50,000

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31 PETER CLAPHAM SHEPPARD, O.S.A., R.C.A. (1882-1965) SKETCH FOR EDGE OF TOWN, EARLY SPRING oil on paperboard signed; Estate stamp with inv no. LG419, titled and dated (later) ‘FIELD SKETCH FOR CANVAS 30X36 in. / EDGE OF TOWN (EARLY SPRING) 1936’ to label on the reverse 8.4 ins x 10.4 ins; 21.3 cms x 26.4 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Ontario $4,000–6,000 VIEW THIS LOT JUNE 4 - 9, 2022

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117

t FRANKLIN CARMICHAEL July is instantly recognizable as a view of Franklin Carmichael’s beloved La Cloche region, about 60 kilometres southwest of Sudbury–as synonymous with each other as Tom Thomson and Algonquin Park. In 1924, when the Group of Seven was growing in stature, fellow Group members Lawren S. Harris, A.Y. Jackson and Arthur Lismer travelled to Algoma; Harris and Jackson went to Jasper, Alberta; Frank Johnston and J.E.H. MacDonald travelled separately to the Canadian Rockies; and that fall Carmichael and Harris went to the north shore of Lake Superior and La Cloche.

Carmichael found in La Cloche a place that would provide stimulation and subjects for more than 20 years.

July is particularly thrilling among his La Cloche subjects in the way the sky, the slight diagonal of the horizon, and chiaroscuro of shadowed hilltops and aerial perspective create a lively tension. The McMichael Canadian Art Collection’s 1936 Hilltops has near-vertical cirrocumulus clouds over La Cloche. This motif is further heightened in July and is as compelling as, and more dynamic than, the abstractions Harris was developing in Santa Fe, New Mexico, at the time. In his own foray into abstraction, Carmichael’s Gambit #1 (1945), also in the McMichael’s collection, employs the same earth tones he used in July, and like Harris’s early abstractions, Carmichael’s composition is easily read in relation to the landscape.

Carmichael’s May 1941 dedication on the verso adds another facet to the sketch’s history. Yvon Doucet studied commercial art and was active in student life at the Ontario College of Art (now, OCAD University) in Toronto at the end of the 1930s in the department Carmichael led. In 1943 Doucet became a member of Toronto’s Arts and Letters Club where Carmichael had been a member since 1917. In 1970, when the Arts and Letters Club had its fiftieth anniversary exhibition of the Group’s formation, Doucet lent July to its last documented public exhibition.

VIEW THIS LOT 118 The Canada Auction

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119

32 FRANKLIN CARMICHAEL, O.S.A., R.C.A. (1890-1945)

PROVENANCE:

JULY, 1939 oil on panel signed and dated; signed, titled and inscribed by artist on the reverse; titled and dated to gallery labels on the reverse 10 ins x 12 ins; 25.4 cms x 30.5 cms

EXHIBITED:

Yvon Doucet, Toronto, ON; Kaspar Gallery, Toronto, ON; Private collection, Toronto, ON Little Pictures by Members of the Ontario Society of Artists, Art Gallery of Toronto, Toronto, ON, 18 November 1939-1 January 1940 as July; The Arts and Letters Club, Toronto, ON, as Clouds $70,000–90,000

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121

tALEXANDER YOUNG JACKSON Of all of the Group of Seven’s members, A.Y. Jackson’s vision for his art remained the steadiest. His works are most stirring — as in St. Urbain, Quebec — when he pays attention to the effect of strong light on the landscape without showing the sun. The light in St. Urbain, Quebec is brighter, almost as raw as paint fresh from the tube. In the early 1920s, when Jackson began his spring sketching trips in Quebec’s Charlevoix region, about 100 kilometres down the St. Lawrence River from Quebec City, he was an accomplished painter who had to acquire fluency with the terrain, its light, and the interplay of both from day-to-day and year-to-year. Around 1932, with the Group on the brink of dissolution and reemergence as the Canadian Group of Painters, the paintings hit a high aesthetic plateau with works such as the Art Gallery of Ontario’s Winter, Charlevoix County (1933) and the McMichael Canadian Art Collection’s Road to Baie St. Paul (1933).

As his physical capacity and stamina changed, his attention to the relationships of colour became bolder. He had used white, blues, rose madder and cadmium yellow for decades in these compositions. They were as true to him as any living friend, and where he once exploited the effects of painted grounds to modulate the light within the picture, here he renders a composition he has rendered in variation dozens of times earlier like a virtuoso musician renders a passage of music they have played for decades. In this painting, with his years of experience, Jackson applied the paint with a bold economy. Enigmatically, and powerfully, the ochre and ultramarine face of the barn, closest and nearly parallel to the picture plane, is a brash compositional choice that reminds how at his best Jackson never ceased thinking about the translation of the landscape through light and paint.

Of importance to prospective bidders, Jackson’s 1933 comments to the Art Gallery of Toronto (now, Art Gallery of Ontario) when it purchased Winter, Charlevoix County specifically states the painting should not be varnished, and the unvarnished state of St. Urbain, Quebec shows the wisdom of his position.

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123

33 ALEXANDER YOUNG JACKSON, O.S.A., R.C.A. (1882-1974) ST. URBAIN, QUEBEC oil on canvas, signed; titled to gallery label on the reverse 20 ins x 26 ins; 50.8 cms x 66 cms PROVENANCE:

Walter Klinkhoff Gallery, Montreal, QC; The Art Emporium, Vancouver, BC; Private collection, Vancouver, BC $130,000—150,000

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34 ALEXANDER YOUNG JACKSON, O.S.A., R.C.A. (1882-1974) APRIL - RIPON, QUE, CIRCA 1960 oil on canvas signed, titled to presentation plaque 21 ins x 25.25 ins; 53.3 cms x 64.1 cms PROVENANCE:

Collection of Dr. George Cooper, Ottawa, ON; Collection of Diana Ainslie, Ottawa, ON $30,000–50,000 VIEW THIS LOT

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Later in life, well into his seventies, A.Y. Jackson could not regularly travel to sketching grounds the way he did a quarter let alone almost a half-century earlier.

Nonetheless, his commitment to painting the land was as strong as his commitment to his evolution as a painter, and he continued to travel around Ontario and Quebec on sketching trips in spring, summer, and fall.

About 75 kilometres northeast of Manotick, Ontario, Ripon, Quebec, was accessible to Jackson after he left Toronto in 1955 to live near his niece outside of Ottawa following the sale of the Studio Building. The land around Ripon is more open, less rolling, and further inland than his beloved Charlevoix region. Its terrain and light were different, and Jackson made them his own. April, Ripon, Que., has features well-loved in Jackson’s winter and spring compositions: light playing on the snow, clusters of farm buildings, split rail fences that lead our eyes through the painting, and a red horse-drawn sleigh.

What is so special about April, Ripon, Que., is Jackson’s adaptation to both his diminishing physical capacity and a new landscape with a new manner of painting.

Summoning the experience of his years, Jackson deftly used lean cadmium yellow, ultramarine and white painted wet-in-wet to define the snow-covered landscape and reflect the turbulent overcast sky. The cloud’s swirls, finials for the barren tree’s crown, and stalks in the foreground activate a composition that is stabilised by the middleground’s buildings topped with lozenges of pale blue, burnt sienna, and a deep green of ultramarine and yellow.

Ever consistent, Jackson’s populated landscape remained distinctly Canadian.

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35 ALFRED JOSEPH CASSON, O.S.A., P.R.C.A. (1898-1992) OLD BARN - GRENVILLE, QUEBEC, 1970 oil on panel signed; signed, titled, dated and inscribed “the property of my wife” on the reverse 12 ins x 15 ins; 30.5 cms x 38.1 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON $30,000–40,000

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In 1958, A.J. Casson retired after a 45-year career in commercial art, during which he was respected for his perfectionism and his refined understanding of colour and linear design. Old Barn–Grenville, Quebec conveys how well Casson could compose. Painted when abstraction dominated artistic trends, Casson’s grey, silhouetted hills and voluminous sky are only understood as such because of the barn in front of them. In their design and painting he created something more like 1950s Giorgio Morandi than 1920s Group of Seven.

The old barn anchors the composition and sets the viewer’s eye in motion. Attention is reflected up to the passages of grey in the top half of the composition, laterally across the fields and bushes beginning to change colour with the season, and reflected out toward the picture plane in the field of grass which rolls like the sea. The face of the barn glows in the light of the sun above to the left outside of the image and torquing to the composition. In a little over a decade of retirement, Casson settled into a new career, no longer an artistdesigner, but strictly an artist.

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tNORA FRANCES ELISABETH COLLYER Collyer became the youngest member of the Beaver Hall Group when she joined in 1920. As her career progressed, so did her friendships with the women of the group, including Sarah Robertson and Anne Savage. Collyer and Savage shared a studio for three years at the founding address of 305 Beaver Hall Hill.

The women of the Beaver Hall Group helped to shape Modernism in Montreal, and exhibited regularly even after disbanding in 1922. The two works here were painted soon after Collyer joined the Federation of Canadian Artists (1946-1981), where her work was featured in five retrospectives.

REFERENCES: Evelyn Walters, The Beaver Hall Group and its Legacy (Toronto: Dundern Press, 2017), 87.

VIEW THIS LOT 130 The Canada Auction

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131

36 NORA FRANCES ELISABETH COLLYER (1898-1979) PERCÉ ROCK, PERCÉ, P.Q., 1953 oil on panel signed; signed, titled, and dated on reverse 12 ins x 14 ins; 30.5 cms x 35.6 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON $7,000–9,000

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Percé Rock is a landmark in the Gaspé Peninsula, Quebec and one of the world’s largest natural arches. The monolith has attracted many artists over the years, including Collyer. Percé Rock is an impressive example of Collyer’s technique for landscape painting, which can be seen in her incorporation of the rolling hills and rich palette.

37 NORA FRANCES ELISABETH COLLYER (1898-1978) OLD BARN, CAP À L’AIGLE, P. QUE, JULY 1947 oil on panel signed; titled and dated “July 1947” on the reverse; titled and dated to gallery label on the reverse; diverse inscriptions on reverse 11.88 ins x 14 ins; 30.2 cms x 35.6 cms PROVENANCE:

Galerie d’art Michel Bigué, Saint-Saveur, QC; Private collection, Toronto, ON

A coastal village scene sourced from the east end of La Malbaie, Old Barn, Cap à L’Aigle is composed of soft rhythms and colour. It was completed in July 1947, a strong period for Collyer following her first solo exhibition at the Dominion Gallery in Montreal in 1946.

REFERENCES:

Evelyn Walters, The Beaver Hall Group and its Legacy (Toronto: Dundern Press, 2017), 87.

$7,000–9,000 JUNE 4 - 9, 2022

133

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tJAMES EDWARD HERVEY MACDONALD When the personalities of the Group of Seven’s members are discussed, J.E.H. MacDonald’s is commonly described in terms of his contemplativeness, poetry and quietude. As the oldest member and the only one of a catalytic trio of Lawren S. Harris and A.Y. Jackson who needed to work to support a family, he also carried a maturity with his approach, purpose, and technique that set him apart then and now.

This understated view across Sand Lake in Ontario’s Algoma region, about 600 kilometres northwest of Toronto requires time from its viewer. MacDonald’s light is refracted through a twilight haze that also appears in his October Evening, Algoma (1921) in the Thomson Collection at the Art Gallery of Ontario, and the AGO’s own The Lake, October Evening (1922). The light activates the viewer’s eyes differently in each of the paintings, and on looking at Sand Lake, Algoma, one needs to let their eyes adjust to the painting. Meeting the painting on its terms and not demanding instant gratification amplifies MacDonald’s accentuated visual poetry. As in rare atmospheric moments like this, the light nearly becomes palpable as something we see and in which we are enveloped.

MacDonald’s greatness as a painter of nuance and tonal subtlety has been overshadowed by the bold compositions of some of his Group of Seven colleagues and by his own masterworks such as Tangled Garden (1916) in the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario and Falls, Montreal River (1920) in the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Ontario. Truly, MacDonald can neither be seen nor understood without understanding paintings like Sand Lake, Algoma that speak softly, surely and reveal themselves like the changing light of eventide.

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137

38 JAMES EDWARD HERVEY MACDONALD, O.S.A., R.C.A. (1873-1932) SAND LAKE, ALGOMA oil on board initialed; initialed and titled on the reverse 8.75 ins x 10.5 ins; 22.2 cms x 26.7 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON $55,000–75,000

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139

t JOHN WILLIAM BEATTY J.W. Beatty’s cropped views of dappled light in forest interiors are classic images in the history of Canadian landscape painting. Senior to the members of the Group of Seven, Beatty opened a path for them in the 1910s when his Evening Cloud of the Northland was exhibited at the Ontario Society of Artists’ 1910 annual exhibition, and acquired by the National Gallery of Canada the next year.

Beatty forged his own iconography of the Canadian landscape, illuminated with a distinct palette and quality of light and shadow. All of these characteristics are in Untitled (Beech Woods). His yellows and reds heighten the sun-struck trunks and dappled ground, contrasting dramatically against smaller trunks in silhouette and deep browns and greens of the foliage and terrain. Unequivocally a representational painting, Untitled (Beech Woods) is charged with the energy one would later see in mid-century abstraction.

VIEW THIS LOT 140 The Canada Auction

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141

39 JOHN WILLIAM BEATTY, O.S.A., R.C.A. (1869-1941) UNTITLED (BEECH WOODS), 1927 oil on panel signed; signed, dated “Nov 26th/27” and inscribed on the reverse: “This painting passes today from my hands to those of a dear student of mine whose progress I have watched for some time & who I know does appreciate it as much for its associations as for its merits the latter of which I pray that it may possess”.

10.375 ins x 13.75 ins; 26.4 cms x 34.9 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Ontario $10,000–15,000

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143

tALAN CASWELL COLLIER Whether or not Alan Collier criss-crossed Canada as frequently as Group of Seven member A.Y. Jackson, he certainly did so with more intention.

Starting in 1956 he spent summers travelling the country, usually by car with a trailer for camping attached and family in tow, painting the landscape.

His majestic Peace River Country is thoroughly a concert of greens and yellows modulated with earth tones with a spectral luminosity, courtesy of Lucite 44. This synthetic resin varnish became available in the 1930s and was soon used by Canadian artists such as L.A.C. Panton, Jock Macdonald and Collier in search of new ways to paint. Added to paint as a medium, it accelerated drying, enabling Collier to work with the rapidity of watercolours, but with a palette and at a size far beyond its confines. Each of Collier’s gestures can be enumerated in this painting of northwestern Alberta that continued the landscape tradition into the post-war era.

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145

40 ALAN CASWELL COLLIER, O.S.A., R.C.A. (1911-1990) PEACE RIVER COUNTRY oil and Lucite 44 on canvas signed; titled to gallery label on the reverse 30 ins x 40 ins; 76.2 cms x 101.6 cms PROVENANCE:

Roberts Gallery, Toronto, ON; Corporate collection, Toronto, ON $8,000–12,000

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147

tWILLIAM GOODRIDGE ROBERTS Cezanne’s influence is clearly felt in this still life, as Roberts hones in on “the precise quality of light and colour relationships, to evaluate carefully the impact of one shape upon the next.” 1 Roberts showed great sensitivity for colour. He would often allow one tone to dominate his compositions, so as to impart a strong sense of atmosphere. Working alla prima, the artist relied on colour to enhance this sense of harmony and unify compositions made in a single sitting. Here, his deference to rich brown tones imparts a wonderfully warm feel, abetted by the long shadows cast by the objects on the table.

Roberts was a master of effortlessly capturing the characteristics of specific objects, always with great looseness and ease, and never overwrought.

In harnessing quotidian objects, the artist “allows the spectator to shift his attention to what the artist has done to the colour, brushwork, and arrangement.”2 Roberts was known for making several paintings in one sitting, and would work “in one place for long stretches, with only slight shifts of the point of view, using the same jugs and pots over and over again. And the same oranges and lemons, and flowers, even if they have withered….” 3 Still lifes were often made by the artist in winter, when he was unable to paint outdoors.

It is worth noting that Roberts often included books of poetry in his still lifes, a nod to both his personal and familial proclivities. Roberts was known to both read and write poetry when not painting, eschewing books on fine art. His father, Theodore, used to tell his son that it was writing, not painting, which was the Roberts family art, and would encourage him in that direction instead—advice that went unheeded by this master painter.4 1

James Borcoman, Goodridge Roberts, A Retrospective, (Ottawa: The National Gallery of Canada, 1969), 37.

2

Borcoman, 31.

3

Borcoman, 23.

4

Borcoman, 23.

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149

41 WILLIAM GOODRIDGE ROBERTS, R.C.A. (1904-1974) STILL LIFE oil on Masonite signed; titled to gallery label on the reverse 32 ins x 36 ins; 81.3 cms x 91.4 cms PROVENANCE:

Dominion Gallery, Montreal, QC; Galerie Walter Klinkhoff, Montreal, QC; Private collection, Montreal, QC $12,000–15,000 150 The Canada Auction

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151

t MOLLY LAMB BOBAK Sky showcases one of Bobak’s most popular subjects: the crowd. While this interest became evident during her time in the Canadian Women’s Army Corps, she explained, “I think that it is an interest I have had ever since I was a kid. I simply love gatherings, mingling... It’s like little ants crawling, the sort of insignificance and yet the beauty of people all getting together.”1 During periods spent living abroad, Bobak thrilled at painting lively scenes and streetscapes. Biographer Michelle Gewurtz notes that “after the birth of her second child, Anny, [Bobak] found it easier to focus on city vistas populated by groups of people, where detail became secondary to a sense of bustling life.”2 Bobak’s mature work saw increased facility as a colourist. Curator Cindy Richmond writes that “the underlying drabness of greyed blues and mat greens and browns gives way to sharper splashes of red and yellow and pink, and these new colours increase the dramatic intensity of the pictures markedly…Molly began to achieve greater control over her use of colour, and also to integrate it more effectively into the architectural structure of her pictures.”3 1

Michelle Gewurtz. Molly Lamb Bobak: Life & Work.

(Toronto: Art Canada Institute, 2018), 20.

2

Gewurtz, 42.

3

Cindy Richmond. Molly Lamb Bobak: A Retrospective.

(Regina: MacKenzie Art Gallery, 1993), 41.

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153

42 MOLLY LAMB BOBAK, R.C.A. (1920-2014) SKY oil on Masonite signed; signed and titled on the reverse; titled to gallery label on the reverse 16 ins x 24 ins; 40.6 cms x 61 cms PROVENANCE:

Walter Klinkhoff Gallery, Montreal, QC; Corporate collection, Toronto, ON $6,000–9,000

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155

t JOHN MEREDITH The 1960s were a different era in the arts.

The depth of belief in an avant-garde, progress in art and individual artistic development two generations ago might be difficult to comprehend through the current interpretive lens of identities and practices. In this context, John Meredith’s March 1967 exhibition at Toronto’s Isaacs Gallery was exemplary in what used to be called ‘breakthrough’ exhibitions, and where he first exhibited the eponymous canvas related to Sketch for Ramadan.

Meredith had been on the Toronto art scene for years, exhibiting regularly and paying his dues as a developing abstract painter – savvy enough to move beyond second-generation Abstract Expressionism, and individual enough to develop his own language instead of aping New York style. In the mid-1960s, he began to use improvised abstractions in pen and ink as the bases for his paintings. Fine and distinct in Toronto, they lacked capital-A ambition.

This changed with the March 1967 exhibition that included the canvas after Sketch for Ramadan.

Reviewing the exhibition in the Toronto Daily Star, Robert Fulford specifically discussed the paintings Atlantis and Ramadan when he observed Meredith’s more complicated paintings, “combine a kind of violence with sensitivity in a uniquely attractive way.” In Sketch for Ramadan we see that violence and sensitivity in prime, unfettered form.

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157

43 JOHN MEREDITH, R.C.A. (1933-2000)

LITERATURE:

SKETCH FOR RAMADAN, 1966 coloured inks on paper signed and dated ‘66; titled and dated to gallery label on the reverse 13.75 ins x 16.75 ins; 34.9 cms x 42.5 cms

$4,000–6,000

PROVENANCE:

The Isaacs Gallery, Toronto, ON; Private collection, Toronto, ON; Waddington’s, Toronto, ON, 23 Nov. 2015, lot 112; Private collection, Toronto, ON

158 The Canada Auction

Ian Thom, John Meredith: Drawings 1957-1980 (catalogue), Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, 1980

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159

t JOHN RICHARD CHAMBERS Jack Chambers left his hometown of London, Ontario, for Europe in the autumn of 1953 with the intention of studying art. The following October he began studying at the Escuela Central de Bellas Artes de San Fernando in Madrid. He graduated in 1959, then began to build a career there until he returned to London in 1961, and remained there until his death in 1978.

Chambers was always ambitious. He was terrifically so when his formal training was concluding and the fuel of collegial support and early exhibitions propelled his artistic, personal and professional development. In the summer of 1958, he and Rosendo Loriente, his classmate from the Escuela de San Fernando, participated in a residency and exhibition in Segovia, after which Chambers gave View from a Window to Loriente. This painting remained in his collection for the rest of his life and passed by descent to the present owner.

View from a Window is a lively exploration of the gap between perception and depiction. In the three zones of foreground, middle-ground and distance, Chambers broke down vision to something precise and seemingly unreal. The angle of the window sill, the volume of the laundry and the space in the distance register as more dream-like than objective. A decade later, after a detour into Pop-influenced paintings and constructions, Chambers returned to views through windows in his London home on Lombardo Avenue, such as Sunday Morning No.2 (1968-1970) in a private collection, Lilacs (1976) and Diego Reading (1976-1977), both in the Art Gallery of Ontario. These mesmerising views extend his metaphorical and perceptual contemplation of in and out, near and far, and intimacy and alienation that took hold in Spain as he conceived View from a Window.

VIEW THIS LOT 160 The Canada Auction

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161

44 JOHN RICHARD (JACK) CHAMBERS, R.C.A. VIEW FROM A WINDOW, 1959 oil on canvas signed and dated 36 ins x 29 ins; 91.4 cms x 73.7 cms PROVENANCE:

Gift of the artist; Rosendo Loriente, Madrid, Spain; By descent to private collection, Spain $15,000-25,000 162 The Canada Auction

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163

tWILLIAM KURELEK Kurelek’s work cannot be separated from his religious faith. A devout Roman Catholic—a faith to which he famously converted in 1957—income from his paintings helped to fund various religious charities. Art historian Andrew Kear, writing for the Art Canada Institute, explains that “although many respected and well-known Western artists of the twentieth century reference or depict Christian themes, narratives, and figures, few went as far as Kurelek did to place their work in the service of church doctrine.”

The artist was interested in using the Christian gospel in a New World, contemporary context, though his intention was not explicitly to convert others. Kurelek explained that “faith is a gift of God, usually given to those who are humble enough to ask for it,” and as such, paintings could only serve as teaching aids.1 1

Ramsay Cook and Avrom Issacs, Kurelek Country: The Art of William Kurelek, (Toronto: Key Porter Books Limited) 1999, 21-22.

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165

45 WILLIAM KURELEK, R.C.A. (1927-1977)

EXHIBITED:

MYSTIC PRAIRIE THEME, 1976 oil on Masonite initialied and dated ‘76; titled on the reverse; also titled and dated to gallery labels on the reverse 16 ins x 18.75 ins; 40.6 cms x 47.6 cms

LITERATURE:

PROVENANCE:

Isaacs Gallery, Toronto, ON

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Regina Collects, Norman Mackenzie Art Gallery, Regina, SK, no. 56 Ramsay Cook and Avrom Isaacs, Kurelek Country: The Art of William Kurelek, (Toronto: Key Porter Books Limited), 1999, 22 $20,000–25,000

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167

tNORVAL H. MORRISSEAU In this work, Morrisseau shows us a strong and powerful Shaman, dressed in ceremonial garb. The orbs that surround him are part of a connection from head/crown to heart indicating the integration of spirit/emotion/ knowledge, rather than distinct elements. This holistic approach is a cornerstone of Indigenous spiritual belief systems.

The image also serves as a representation of the artist.

Like a shaman, the artist is a connection between the spirit and earthly realms and through his work is able to communicate something important to the community.

In Canada, traditional Indigenous ceremonies were banned until the 1950s. It wasn’t until the 1980s that Shamanistic rituals and ceremonies again became openly practised within communities. The German philosopher Walter Benjamin, believed that the loss of rituals posed a threat to humanity. This painting, made circa 1975, is a defiant manifesto in reclaiming the traditions and belief systems of First Nations people.

Virginia MacDonnell Eichhorn is an art historian, curator and writer who has been working within the international visual arts world for over 30 years. A contributor to numerous arts journals and catalogue essayist, her curatorial practice encompasses environmental and ecological art, feminism, material culture, presentation within non-traditional environments, and Indigenous art.

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169

t

46 NORVAL H. MORRISSEAU (1932-2007), ANISHINAABE (OJIBWE) SHAMAN, CIRCA 1975 oil on artist board signed in syllabics 39.5 ins x 32 ins; 100.3 cms x 81.3 cms PROVENANCE:

Acquired in Kenora, ON; Private collection, Winnipeg, MB; Private collection, Toronto, ON NOTE:

This painting was used as the basis for a series of silkscreens on linen. $15,000–25,000 170 The Canada Auction

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171

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47 NORVAL H. MORRISSEAU (1932-2007), ANISHINAABE (OJIBWE) SILENT EYE, c. 1974 acrylic on canvas signed in syllabics 69 x 37 in — 175.3 x 94 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Calgary, AB $12,000–16,000 This “silent eye” is here with us as a witness. Painted circa 1974, it was a time of rising Indigenous activism in response to systematic oppression of the Indigenous people of Canada. In 1974 the Native People’s Caravan travelled from Vancouver to Parliament Hill to raise awareness about the poor living conditions and endemic discrimination experienced by the Indigenous people in Canada, and also as means to unite Indigenous peoples across Canada. Also in 1974, Ojibwa Warriors Society and allies assembled in Anicinabe Park (Kenora, ON) to protest for equality.

Morrisseau’s Silent Eye is the witness to all that had gone on previously and to what was occurring then. This work embodies the power of First Nations spirituality and beliefs, and their perseverance despite adversity. Their enduring power is represented here by Morrisseau’s transformational figure, who synthesises attributes of the human and animal (natural) world. The seven “eyes” can be seen as symbols of the Seven Generations, referring to the prophecy among First Nations called “the seventh generation,” which speaks of a time thought to be seven generations after first contact with Europeans, when Indigenous youth and allies from all races come together to enact a new age of healing and rebirth for Indigenous people and Turtle Island.

We would like to thank Virginia MacDonnell Eichhorn for contributing this essay.

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173

48 NORVAL H. MORRISSEAU (1932-2007), ANISHINAABE (OJIBWE) MOTHER AND CHILD acrylic on paper on card signed in syllabics 30 x 22.25 in — 76.2 x 56.5 cm PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist; Estate of Robert Lavack, North Bay, ON NOTE:

Purchased directly from the artist in 1971 by Mr. Robert Lavack.

Mr. Lavack was employed by the Ontario Department of Education and stationed in North Bay, ON. Lavack promoted Morrisseau’s work and arranged art tours between 1970-1972.

Morrisseau became great friends with Lavack and his family.

Accompanied with a signed letter from Robert Lavack in support of provenance. $6,000–8,000 Likely for as long as humankind has been making art, artists have made images of mothers with children. Morrisseau is no exception, creating several versions throughout his career.

This work in particular is unique: in most of his depictions the mother and child are presented in profile facing each other, connecting through intense eye contact, whereas in this work, the pair are shown as being fully integrated with one another. The mother holds the child close to her breast, nursing and nurturing, enclosing the child protectively in her arms.

It is far more than a simple portrayal of maternal love. Within First Nations beliefs, the connection between generations is understood as being powerful and essential to the success and continuity of the community. Children are seen as a gift from the Creator and that it is through the passing of their language, beliefs and traditions to their children that the communities will continue.

The painting can also be read as an evocation of the role of the artist within society. In this case the mother is the Creator herself, source of all, who holds the artist close and shares with him the ability to understand and see all that is in both the visible and Spirit realm and to share that knowledge with others. It is a reminder that power comes from the connection to Spirit and to the community we share. We are not alone.

This work is a celebration of life and the sustenance of life in all its forms, from the most primal and essential form which is the feeding of a child to that which sustains us metaphorically and spiritually. This painting is rich with multiple meanings and potently encapsulates many of the ideas and themes that Morrisseau explored within his lifetime.

We would like to thank Virginia MacDonnell Eichhorn for contributing this essay VIEW THIS LOT

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175

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177

t GREGORY RICHARD CURNOE Cityscape by Greg Curnoe is an important and rare early work by the artist, one which represents the artist’s unique visual language within the context of Canadian art of the 20th century. Although simple in composition, Cityscape is complex in its ideologies, situated at the intersection of politics, life and art. Produced in 1967, the Cityscape series was an autobiographical expression of Curnoe’s feelings towards his cultural environment. This canvas reads: THE CORNER OF THE DIRTY BRICK WALL IS ABOUT THIRTY FEET AWAY THE LEFT SIDE IS S In Curnoe’s wordscapes, the letters simultaneously blend into the white canvas and stand out, forcing the viewer to read the text, while also considering the image as a whole.

The artist’s interest in text stems from a childhood gift: a rubber stamp set. Curnoe also played with discarded date stamps sourced from his father’s office, explaining: “It was so natural for me to associate type and text with a picture. And I quickly learned there are things you can do with a text that you can’t do with a picture.” Accordingly, text plays a role in the majority of Curnoe’s works.

Greg Curnoe, edited transcript of an interview with Artviews [Fred Gaysek] about I Tell Stories exhibition, December 3, 1987, Greg Curnoe Fonds, Writings File 1987, E.P. Taylor Research Library and Archives, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto.

VIEW THIS LOT 178 The Canada Auction

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179

49 GREGORY RICHARD CURNOE (1936-1992) CITYSCAPE, BACK LEFT WINDOW, 1967 marking ink and latex on canvas signed, titled and dated to stretcher; titled to artist label on the reverse 19.5 ins x 15.5 ins; 49.5 cms x 39.4 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON

EXHIBITED:

“Greg Curnoe”, Isaacs Gallery, Toronto, ON, 5-24 February 1969.

LITERATURE:

Isaacs Seen: 50 years on the art front, a gallery scrapbook compiled by Donnalu Wigmore. ed Donnalu Wigmore (Toronto: Hart House, Justina M. Barnicke Gallery), 2005: 67 repro. in installation photo of Curnoe, Kamikaze (1967), at Isaacs Gallery, 5-24 February 1969. $5,000–7,000

180 The Canada Auction

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181

tRON BLOORE Ron Bloore preferred his paintings to directly engage the viewer without any mediation, allowing their immediate perception to determine their reaction to the piece. Neither titles nor discussions of meaning or content were relevant. In the artist’s words, “the meaning of any work of art is determined entirely by the individual experiencing it.” Every viewer comes to the painting with the wealth of their experience and emotion, and the encounter with the painting is supposed to be a new encounter in their life, not an occasion to read a brochure.

For Bloore, painting is given revelatory power, one rooted in the viewer, but demanding a dialogue between lived experience and the image. Bloore’s work from this period was characterised by an interest in experimenting with destabilising the painted surface as a two-dimensional space, seeking to play with surface and texture to create absorbing and expansive works. Here, the irregular forms with hatching on a field of hatching at other angles maintains energy and motion in the painting. Referring to nothing other than itself, it is a painting that multiplies that which the viewer brings to it.

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183

50 RONALD LANGLEY BLOORE (1925-2009) UNTITLED oil on Masonite 24 ins x 24 ins; 61 cms x 61 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, British Columbia $5,000–7,000

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185

tRAYMOND JOHN MEAD Completed at the end of Mead’s career, Untitled showcases the artist’s intention to paint simple, almost primal marks—which he executed with great sophistication and mastery of his palette. Reduced to their minimum, Mead still manages to infuse his art with a playful element, simultaneously elegant and whimsical, and always expressing the hand of the artist. Mead made sure that his work was never seamless, preferring to work in layers that allowed the viewer a glimpse into what lay beneath—which should be experienced in person, unmitigated by the computer screen.

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187

51 RAYMOND JOHN MEAD (1921-1998) UNTITLED, 1994 acrylic on canvas signed 20 ins x 28 ins; 50.8 cms x 71.1 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, British Columbia $3,000–5,000

188 The Canada Auction

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189

t TAKAO TANABE ​ he early 1960s were a period of broad T experimentation for Tanabe, who had returned to Vancouver in 1961 after three years spent in Japan.

Tanabe’s wife, Anona Thorne, notes that the faint shape at the bottom of Untitled evokes the artist’s interest in maritime bollard-shapes. An exhibition by the artist at Vancouver’s New Design Gallery in 1964 “exploited frankly phallic potential of some bollards that had attracted Tanabe’s attention in the dockyards on Burrard Inlet,” going so far as to draw the censure of local police—to the delight of the gallery’s co-owner Alvin Balkind. Roald Nasgaard notes that “other works in the series are more subdued, at first glance almost incipient colour-field paintings: that is, until the viewer discovers the fleshy creases and folds drawn discreetly into the white surrounds of the flattened mooring post heads that dominate the centre of the compositions.” 1 1

Roald Nasgaard. “Adventures in Abstraction.” Takao Tanabe, ed. Ian Thom. (Vancouver Art Gallery and Douglas & McIntyre: Vancouver, 2005), 46.

We would like to thank Anona Thorne for her contributions to this essay.

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191

52 TAKAO TANABE (b. 1926) UNTITLED, 1964 oil on canvas signed and dated ‘64 60 ins x 34 ins; 152.4 cms x 86.4 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON $15,000–20,000

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193

t GERSHON ISKOWITZ In 1967, Iskowitz began a regular practice of working in a series of variations on a similar composition. For this 1980 suite of paintings, Iskowitz worked with reduced elements, a dominant “figure” and colour on a dominant ground colour. The “figure” is an irregular shape akin to cumulus humilis cloud forms. Professor Theodore Heinrich wrote of Iskowitz lying on grass gazing up “through the leafy tent of a tree or through rents in cloud cover [as a] source for intense chromatic adventure.” 1 These figures are “distributed,” floating, with no implied movement or direction. Of the approximately fifteen paintings in this series, six known works have blue grounds of varying tones; red is the most frequently-used “figure” colour. However, as with all of Iskowitz’s abstract paintings, there is subtle and complex layering, a hallmark of his work beginning in the early 1960s. The red figure ”cloud” elements in Blue Red - G have highlights of yellow at the edges. Secondary and less-pronounced “figure” patches of lighter blues—with some yellow highlights—create a dimensional quality rather than the flatness associated with “Greenberg” post-painterly abstraction.

The reductive quality of this series harkens to Iskowitz’s so-titled “landscape” abstract paintings from 1967, as he did return to earlier compositions, and again in his last works done in 1987. See Autumn Landscape #2, collection of the Art Gallery of York University.

Four of the 1980 series were shown at Gallery Moos, Toronto, January-February 1981.

Theodore Allen Heinrich, “The intimate cartography of Gershon Iskowitz’s painting,” artscanada, (May/June 1977), 12.

Ihor Holubizky is a cultural essayist and art historian. He received his PhD in art history from the University of Queensland.

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195

53 GERSHON ISKOWITZ, R.C.A. (1921-1988) BLUE RED - G, 1980 oil on canvas signed, titled and dated to the reverse; inventory no. B123 48 ins x 42 ins; 121.9 cms x 106.7 cms PROVENANCE:

Artist’s studio; Gershon Iskowitz Foundation NOTE:

Proceeds from the sale of this lot to benefit the Gershon Iskowitz Foundation. $10,000–15,000

196 The Canada Auction

54 GERSHON ISKOWITZ, R.C.A. (1921-1988) MIDNIGHT #9, 1986 oil on canvas signed, titled, and dated to the reverse; inventory no. B284 38 ins x 33 ins; 96.5 cms x 83.8 cms PROVENANCE:

Gallery Moos, Toronto, ON; Miriam Shiell Fine Art, Toronto, ON; Gershon Iskowitz Foundation NOTE:

Proceeds from the sale of this lot to benefit the Gershon Iskowitz Foundation. $8,000–12,000

Gershon Iskowitz, Walter Moos, in front of Gershon Iskowitz "Midnight #3" 1986, oil on canvas diptych. January 1987 Photo, A. Newman. Courtesy of the Estate of Walter Moos.

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In the early 1980s, Iskowitz returned to painting bold and colourful “lozenge figures” that first appeared in his Lowlands series, 1969-1970, and in the first of the critically celebrated Uplands paintings in 1970 (collection National Gallery of Canada). The palette-range for the “lozenges” are purple, red, green, yellow and blues against primarily red, blue and green “grounds.” Titles varied for these related paintings; Northern Lights, Sunlight and Midnight. This period of work included Iskowitz’s ambitious multi-panelled, large scale Septet paintings, 1984-1986, with the title-preface Northern Lights. A rare Iskowitz statement from 1986 can be applied to Midnight #9: “[to] create…space and depth in terms of the sky and flying shape.” He also referred to his 1967 Churchill, Manitoba trip, which served as the catalyst and inspiration for the Lowlands and Uplands paintings.

In Midnight #9, and related works, Iskowitz, created a subtle “second figure” in purple with white highlights on the darker blue ground. The “lozenges” float on this double-ground deep-space in a dramatic and calculated balance of warm/hot and cool colours. Iskowitz did not make studies for paintings; rather they were disciplined responses and a “direct approach [and doesn’t matter if it takes three hours or finish it, or three days or three months.]” 1 The Midnight paintings were shown in his final lifetime exhibition at Gallery Moos, November 29, 1986-January 9, 1987. In the last formal publicity photograph, Iskowitz and long-time dealer Walter Moos are posed in front of the Midnight #3 diptych.

Closely related to Midnight #9 is one of only two Iskowitz print editions, Midnight #2, 1987; an impression is in the collection of the Art Gallery of Ontario. Midnight A, 1986, is in the collection of the Art Gallery of Windsor; Midnight #4 (diptych) 1986 is in the collection of the Glenbow Museum. Related “Northern Lights” paintings are in the collections of Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal, Nickle Arts Museum, Calgary and the Art Gallery of Peterborough.

1 “Round Midnight, Gershon Iskowitz in conversation with David Bolduc,” Proof Only 1, no. 3 (January 15, 1974.)

REFERENCES

Ihor Holubizky, “Northern Lights Septet No. 3, 1985”, in Gershon Iskowitz Life & Works, Art Canada Institute

Ihor Holubizky is a cultural essayist and art historian. He received his PhD in art history from the University of Queensland.

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tTOM HOPKINS We recognized this painting fondly as “one of dad’s bowls.” My brother and I are intimately familiar with the themes in our father’s work, and his bowl series is as prominent in our psyche as his boat ones. He was interested in the idea of water; the interplay between open oceans, versus constrained canals. This idea also serves as a metaphor for life; the free flow of something being shaped and guided, by forms and boundaries. The bowl was a vessel to explore this theme.

Looking at where the bowl lives in this painting, the nature of place in our dad’s work came up. He had an ability to create imagined architectural structures that beautifully guide water, light, and mood. I remember reading C.S Lewis’ Magician’s Nephew for the first time as a child, and discovering the wood between the worlds; a sublime orchard filled with ponds that led to other worlds. Because these other worlds were often volatile, this orchard in comparison was a refuge. I was immediately reminded of the places in dad’s paintings, and more broadly, in his life. He created places you wanted to go.

A skilled carpenter, he built homes and studios that became oases of creativity and safety, visitors always eager to stop by. Inside these places, it smelled of fresh coffee and oil paint. Always a nook around the corner where you could take a nap to refresh the mind. In the evenings, a surprisingly cozy meal simmered on the old metal camping stove; Studio Stew (a can of pea soup improvised with some chopped ham and potato, and whatever else he could find).

He also created this kind of space in his life, where the art’s community he loved had a place to come, to talk, to rest. Neighbours, friends, students. He made time.

The flow of water, the flow of life, being pulled and pushed by the structures and pathways we build for ourselves. It’s how you build those structures that make life worth living. And he was a master builder. This painting was a nice reminder of that.

Anna Hopkins is an actor and screenwriter based in Toronto, and Jacob Hopkins is a photographer, carpenter and film tech based in Montreal. Whenever they can, they love to collaborate together.

Waddington’s would like to thank Jacob and Anna for contributing this essay.

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55 TOM HOPKINS (1944-2011) THE WATER (SEARCH), 2006 acrylic and oil on canvas signed; signed, titled and dated on the reverse 36 ins x 30 ins; 91.4 cms x 76.2 cms PROVENANCE:

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t DOROTHY KNOWLES Best known for her landscapes, this riotous hothouse bouquet shows Knowles bringing the outdoors in. Painted in 1980, Knowles was known to work on floral still lifes during the cooler, more house-bound months of the long Saskatchewan winter. Green Table: Chrysanthemums and Tulips identifies the precise date this painting was completed—March 21—functioning as a sort of diary, as told through greenery. The composition is informal, with the flowers tilting to one side rather than carefully arranged in the centre of the canvas: the effect is modern. Knowles dials up the palette of her cut flowers, which pop against the more sombre backdrop — perhaps signifying the promise of spring.

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56 DOROTHY KNOWLES, R.C.A. (b. 1927) GREEN TABLE SERIES: CHRYSANTHEMUMS & TULIPS, 1986 oil on canvas signed, titled and dated “March 21/86” on the reverse 40 ins x 40 ins; 101.6 cms x 101.6 cms PROVENANCE:

Theo Waddington Galleries, Montreal, QC; Private collection, Montreal, QC $5,000–7,000

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t NICHOLAS DE GRANDMAISON When de Grandmaison’s investments in the Winnipeg wheat market and local corn exchange were wiped out in the crash of 1929, the artist found himself lacking in both income and commissions. He began thinking about creating general interest works which could be sold to a range of collectors, which resulted in his travelling to The Pas in Northern Manitoba in search of good subjects. The fruits of his labour were exhibited in 1930 at Richardson’s Gallery in Winnipeg.

The show was well received though sales were slow— until a wealthy American businessman bought six of his portraits of Indigenous sitters. This would become his great focus, and de Grandmaison travelled to several reserves in search of subjects.

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57 NICHOLAS DE GRANDMAISON, R.C.A. (1892-1978) PAPOOSE pastel on paper signed sight 16 ins x 12.25 ins; 38.1 cms x 30.5 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Vancouver, BC $20,000–22,000

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tSTANLEY MOREL COSGROVE Of the artist’s work, Jacques de Roussan noted: “as if each tree, each road, each facial characteristic concealed a mystery he [Cosgrove] suggests to us but the key which he does not wish to give us, perhaps through diffidence.”1 Sweet and soulful, this painting is classic Cosgrove: a placid and detached subject, outlined with a single brushstroke, in a monochrome palette. Cosgrove’s talent for illustrating the delicateness of his sitters’ features with strong, bolded lines is impressively demonstrated in Girl in Brown Dress. This painterly technique was also used in the landscape and still-life works that Cosgrove consistently returned to throughout his life. His refusal to stray from his original style is what set Cosgrove apart from his peers–and caught the attention of critics.

1 Jules Bazin, Cosgrove (Laprairie, QC: M. Broquet, 1980), 5.

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58 STANLEY MOREL COSGROVE, R.C.A. (1911-2002) GIRL IN BROWN DRESS oil on canvas signed; titled to gallery label on the reverse 10.5 ins x 8.5 ins; 26.7 cms x 21.6 cms PROVENANCE:

Dominion Gallery, Montreal, QC; Private collection, Montreal, QC $3,000–5,000

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tPIERRE KARLIK Karlik was commissioned to carve this coat of arms, which was presented to John Turner, who had just been appointed as the Minister of Justice and Attorney-General of Canada and the Northwest Territories, on April 11, 1969, on the occasion of his being admitted to practice within the Arctic Circle. The coat of arms, as noted on the plaque, was presented to Turner by William George Morrow, one of the first Canadians to champion the legal and cultural cause of the North’s indigenous peoples. Morrow took on the quest for greater justice long before this had become part of our national conscience.1 Karlik was well known for both his masterful carving and his ability to capture great detail, which perhaps influenced his being chosen for the commission. Art historian Emily E. Auger notes that Karlik is “one of the few Inuit artists interested in putting his feelings into his work; he deliberately tries to make carvings that will encourage people to understand each other better and to communicate more. He becomes involved in carving through his desire to communicate a specific message.”2 1 William G. Morrow, Northern Justice: The Memoirs Of Mr. Justice William G. Morrow, ed. Will Morrow. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1995) www.osgoodesociety.ca/ 2 Emily E. Auger, The Way of Inuit Art, Aesthetics and History in and Beyond the Arctic, (North Carolina: McFarland & Company Inc., 2005), 167.

Click here to read more about John Turner: The Canadian Encyclopedia

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59 PIERRE KARLIK (1931-2013), KANGIQLINIQ (RANKIN INLET) ROYAL COAT OF ARMS OF CANADA stone, carved in relief; signed and disc number inscribed to the reverse; the walnut stand including a presentation plaque to the Honourable John N. Turner 16 x 12.25 x 1 in — 40.6 x 31.1 x 2.5 cm PROVENANCE:

Presented to the Hon. John N. Turner, April 1969; By descent to Geills M. Turner, Toronto, ON $2,000—3,000 NOTE:

Plaque inscribed: Presented to the Hon. JOHN N. TURNER, P.C., O.C., Minister of Justice and Attorney-General of Canada and the Northwest Territories, by the Hon. Mr. Justice William G. Morrow, Judge of the Territorial Court of the Northwest Territories, on the occasion of his being admitted to practice with the Arctic Circle, Pond Inlet, N.W.T., April 11th, 1969.

Justice William G. Morrow, one of the first Canadians to champion the legal and cultural cause of the North’s indigenous people, took on the quest for greater justice long before this had become part of our national conscience.

My husband was honoured to receive it and treasured it all his life.

It was always present in his office wherever he was. To travel with Judge Morrow across the high arctic, stopping in small northern communities to witness court being held in a school, was a very moving experience, seeing justice come to the community. This special carving served as a reminder of an amazing northern experience, happily one of many which we experienced.

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60 CARL JOHAN TRYGG (SWEDISH/CANADIAN, 1887-1954) FOUR CARICATURE FIGURES flat plane carved and polychromed basswood, each signed and dated on the bottom each approx. height 11 ins; 27.9 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, British Columbia $300—500

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A master of 20th century wood carving, Carl Johan Trygg was known for his works in the Scandinavian flat-plane style. Working with his three sons, Trygg is estimated to have carved over 10,000 figures.

Born in 1887 in Skagershult, Närke, Örebro county, Sweden to a family of nine, Trygg left home at the age of twelve. He would hold a series of jobs while pursuing his carving as a way to supplement his income. In 1915, Trygg exhibited his work in Stockholm, Sweden, the success of which allowed him to pursue carving full time. In 1928, Trygg and his family emigrated, ultimately settling in Montreal, Quebec. The workshop they established serviced the tourist trade, producing vibrantly painted carvings made from basswood or pine.

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QUEBEC PAINTED IRON AND WOOD HORSE FORM TOBACCO CUTTER, 19TH CENTURY 11.5 ins x 14 ins x 21.2 ins; 29.2 cms x 35.6 cms x 53.8 cms PROVENANCE:

Ex: The Wiser’s Canadiana Collection, Montreal, QC $400—600

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Quebec voyageurs—the French word for traveller—were contracted employees who worked for the trading firms active in Canada from the 1690s until the 1850s. These men were hired to move furs and other sundries across the untamed landscape, through often treacherous conditions, traversing a route of 5,000 kilometres. Days were long and gruelling, consisting of at least 14 hours per day of hard physical labour. Each hour, a stop was made for a few minutes to allow the voyageurs to smoke a pipe.

Understandably, this pause became so cherished that distances came to be measured in pipes. As an example, “3 pipes might equal 15 to 20 miles of travel. A 32 km lake would be measured as 4 pipes or 4 hours of travel, depending on wind and waves.”

Tobacco became so ingrained in Quebecois culture that even the most utilitarian items associated with smoking or chewing tobacco became charming works of folk art, as evidenced here.

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62 E. A. McROBERTS (CANADIAN, FL. 19TH/EARLY 20TH CENTURIES) CANADIAN BARQUE ‘BIRNAM WOOD’ oil on canvas, signed lower right and dated 1902 image 24.25 ins x 36 ins; 61.6 cms x 91.4 cms $1,000—1,500 In August of 1902, returning to her home port of St. John, New Brunswick from Rio de Janeiro, yellow fever struck the crew of the barque ‘Birnam Wood’. Three men died and were buried at sea and the captain and other crew members became gravely ill. The current lot represents the ship anchored in quarantine at Partridge Island, off the St. John coast, flying signals of distress.

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The Professional Native Indian Artists Inc.

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DAPHNE ODJIG CHILDHOOD IMAGINATIONS: OF KINGS AND QUEENS AND STUFF LIKE THAT, 1997 (detail)

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THE PROFESSIONAL NATIVE INDIAN ARTISTS INC. When I was asked to write an introduction for this important collection, I hesitated.

The reason for my reluctance was the responsibility for conveying, in a single page, the extraordinary collective and individual impact of the Professional Native Indian Artists Inc. (PNIAI) on the arts in Canada.

The seven artists, Jackson Beardy, Daphne Odjig, Alex Janvier, Eddy Cobiness, Norval Morrisseau, Carl Ray and Joseph Sánchez, have changed how we think about contemporary art, art history, the art market, and art and activism. The opportunity to share the group’s profound impact to a broader audience soon alleviated any hesitation I had.

PNIAI came together in the early 1970s to address and redress the exclusion of Indigenous contemporary artists from art markets and galleries in Canada. While each had burgeoning independent practices, together they were able to find and provide the support they were consistently denied.

As the first arts collective of its kind in Canada, PNIAI worked tirelessly to advocate for themselves and Indigenous artists across Canada. The value of a collection such as this lies, in part, in its collectivity.

PNIAI, in all their different contexts, grew up, trained to be artists, made art, had families, and worked in a social, economic, and political climate created by the Indian Act (1876). Mi’kmaw scholar Bonita Lawrence demonstrates the pervasive impact of the Indian Act in Canada and Indian policy in the USA by focussing, in part on the name given to indigenous people, ‘Indian,’ and how that nomenclature in governance policy succeeded in, “reducing the members of hundreds of extremely different nations, ethnicities, and language groups to a common raced identity as Indian.” Importantly, PNIAI came together in a country that produced this race-based policy that impacted the tastes, trends, and expectations for art and artists working both within Canada and internationally. Such impacts manifested in persistent relegation of Indigenous art to categories of ethnography and craft, while contemporary art galleries rejected or ignored contemporary Indigenous artists, and primary and secondary markets operated with contradictory aesthetic criteria of “too Indian” and “not Indian” enough.

PNIAI joined their considerable resources (both personal and professional) into the first

Indigenous- led, contemporary arts activist collective. The impacts of their efforts on Canadian and Indigenous art histories in Canada have yet to be fully realized. PNIAI has influenced at least three generations of artists, dealers, curators, and scholars through engaging in the structures that feed art markets and denied contemporary Indigenous artists’ access. They opened galleries and print shops, curated exhibitions, informed and shaped Indigenous arts policy at the federal government level, and taught in universities and colleges. Each of these artists engaged with Indigenous and nonIndigenous arts communities while continuing to produce innovative and exceptional art.

Each artist worked collectively to advocate for Indigenous contemporary art, while continuing to innovate and push distinct aesthetics, by critically engaging with movements and shifts in European, Canadian, and Indigenous art histories. In making this statement, you might feel that I exaggerate, but that is not the case with this group.

They mobilized difference in support of arts advocacy through their legitimacy as professional artists, educators, dealers, curators, and art historians.

Rachelle Dickenson is Senior Curator, Ottawa Art Gallery.

Dickenson co-curated Àbadakone | Continuous Fire | Feu Continuel in the Indigenous Art Department at the National Gallery of Canada, and has taught courses in curatorial studies, Indigenous and settler art histories, and critical museology at NSCAD University and Carleton University, Dickenson obtained a PhD from the School of Indigenous and Canadian Studies at Carleton University.

1

Bonita Lawrence, ‘Gender, Race, and the Regulation of Native Identity’ in Canada and the United States: An Overview, Hypatia 18, no. 2 (2003): 4- 5 2

Tom Hill, ‘Indian Art in Canada: An Historical Perspective,’ in Norval Morrisseau and the Emergence of the Image Makers, ed. Hill, Tom, and Elizabeth McLuhan (Toronto: Methuen, 1984), 11–27. Lee-Ann Martin, ‘Contemporary First Nations Art since 1970: Individual Practices and Collective Activism’, in The Visual Arts in Canada: The Twentieth Century (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), 371–91.

3 Michelle LaVallee, ed., 7: Professional Native Indian Artists Inc. (Regina, Saskatchewan: MacKenzie Art Gallery, 2014).

4

Ibid.

tNORVAL MORRISSEAU “My art speaks and will continue to speak transcending barriers of nationality, of language and of other forces that may be divisive, fortifying the greatness of the spirit which has always been the foundation of the Great Ojibway.”

- Norval Morrisseau

Norval Morrisseau, also known as Copper Thunderbird, was born in 1931 on the Sand Point Ojibwe Reserve near Beardmore, Ontario.

In accordance with Anishnaabe tradition, he was raised by his maternal grandparents. His grandfather, Moses Potan Nanakonagos, a shaman, taught him the Ojibwe language, history, traditions and legends. His grandmother, Grace Theresa Potan Nanakonagos, was a devout Catholic who taught him the tenets of Christianity.

The contrast between these two religious traditions became an important factor in his intellectual and artistic development.

At the age of 19, Morrisseau became very ill. When mainstream medicine failed to cure his deteriorating health, his mother called upon a medicine-woman to perform a renaming ceremony. According to Anishnaabe tradition, giving a powerful name to a dying person can give them new energy and save their life. Morrisseau recovered after the ceremony and from then on always signed his works with his new name: Copper Thunderbird.

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Morrisseau was self-taught and developed his own techniques and artistic vocabulary.

Initially he painted on any material that he could find, especially birchbark, and also moose hide. During the 1950s Morrisseau collected traditional narratives and oral history providing inspiration and subject matter for his paintings. He also drew upon his own dreams and visions. Morrisseau said, “all my painting and drawing is really a continuation of the shaman’s scrolls.” In addition to the legends of his people, his work depicted the cultural and political tensions between Indigenous and European traditions, his personal existential struggles, and deep spirituality and mysticism.

Morrisseau is credited for creating the Woodland School of Art style, also known as Legend Painting or Medicine Painting, a distinct style blending traditional legends and myths with contemporary mediums. It explores the relationships between people, animals and plants and is rich with spiritual imagery and symbolism.

In the 1960s, Jack Pollock, a Toronto art dealer, helped introduce Morrisseau’s art to a wider audience. The two initially met in 1962 while Pollock was teaching a painting workshop in Beardmore. Struck by the genius

of Morrisseau’s art, he immediately organized an exhibition of his work at his Toronto gallery.

One of Morrisseau’s early commissions was for a large mural in the Indians of Canada Pavilion at Expo ‘67, a revolutionary exhibit voicing the dissatisfaction of the First Nations People of Canada with their social and political situation. In 1989, Morrisseau was the only Canadian painter invited to display his art at the Museum of Modern Art in Paris, to coincide with the bicentennial of the French Revolution.

In 2005 and 2006, the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa organised a retrospective of his work – the first time that the museum had dedicated a solo exposition to an Indigenous artist.

Dubbed the “Picasso of the North,” Morrisseau was also awarded the Order of Canada for his contribution to Canadian art.

He had laid the groundwork for Indigenous art to enter the mainstream artistic scene.

An inspiration to generations of artists, his signature pictographic style was imitated and copied by many. Through all his many challenges, Morrisseau’s art and dedication to telling his people’s stories persevered.

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63 NORVAL H. MORRISSEAU (1932-2007) SHAMAN AND APPRENTICE, 1978 acrylic on canvas signed in syllabics; titled and dated to gallery labels on the reverse 52.25 ins x 38 ins; 132.7 cms x 96.5 cms PROVENANCE:

The Pollock Gallery Ltd., Toronto, ON; Kinsman Robinson Galleries, Toronto, ON; Private collection, Ontario $20,000–30,000 In Shaman and Apprentice, two figures—one crowned with a bird-like animal—are closely intertwined, and appear engaged in an apparent transfer of power. The figures’ tongues protrude from their mouths, resting in close proximity, a characteristic often associated with an exchange of otherworldly energy in historic Woodlands iconography.

The image exhibits brilliant colour. Although known throughout his career as a gifted colourist, Morrisseau’s work in the late 1970s was becoming more vivid. Informed by traditions that acknowledge the capacity of material representations to effect spiritual interactions, the artist has explained his use of colour: “we can learn how to heal people with colour…My art reminds a lot of people of what they are…Many times people tell me that I’ve cured them of something, whatever’s ailing them…It was the colour of the painting that did that.” 1 In the mid-1970s, Morrisseau had entered the mainstream. His first sold-out exhibition at the Pollock Gallery was in 1962, over 15 years before Shaman and Apprentice was painted. His work had by this time entered major institutional collections, including the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, The Glenbow Museum in Calgary, and the Museum of History in Gatineau, Quebec. Morrisseau would be awarded the Order of Canada the same year he painted Shaman and Apprentice –an artist at the height of his powers.

1 Norval Morrisseau, Travels to the House of Invention (Toronto: Key Porter Books, 1997), 16–17.

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64 NORVAL H. MORRISSEAU (1932-2007) NUDE WOMAN WITH SNAKE, CA. 1970 oil on illustration board signed in syllabics sight 28 ins x 23 ins; 71.1 cms x 58.4 cms PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist; Estate of Stan Lozenski; Private collection, Ontario Accompanied with a notarized letter of supporting provenance. $8,000–10,000 A recurring theme in Morrisseau’s work, in Nude Women with Snake, interconnected circles sit wrapped around, and in close proximity to figures, in this instance a serpent intertwined with a woman.

As in many works by the artist, images are steeped in concepts and stories inspired by imagery reclaimed from Midewiwin, a secretive religion common among Anishinaabeg, about which little is divulged to those uninitiated into its rites. While definite meaning may elude us in Morrisseau’s artworks, the power and emotion with which the images are imbued resonate among collectors and those who knew the artist.

This painting was given by Morrisseau to Stan Lozenski, a guard at the Kenora, Ontario jail. Lozenski befriended Morrisseau during his time in the region and assisted him in his need to continue painting by buying art supplies for him directly. As a gesture of gratitude, the artist gave several paintings to Lozenski. The works were hung on the walls of the Lozenskis’ cabin outside Kenora until Stan’s death in 1988, after which his wife tucked the paintings into spare bedrooms and closets in their home. This is the first time that these 1970s paintings will be offered at auction.

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65 NORVAL H. MORRISSEAU (1932-2007) QUAIL FAMILY, 1973 acrylic on artist board signed in syllabics; titled and dated to gallery labels on the reverse 33.25 ins x 32.25 ins; 84.5 cms x 81.9 cms PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist; Kinsman Robinson Galleries, Toronto, ON; Gallery Gevik, Toronto, ON; Private collection, Ontario $15,000–20,000 Morrisseau at his technical finest, Quail Family showcases crisp, wellexecuted lines combined with the artist’s preference for a balanced composition. The more subtle, earthy palette is in line with the artist’s work from the late 1950s through to the early 1970s, and perfectly captures the bond between a mother and her young.

Animals in the painting exhibit x-ray-like features, and as in lot 64 show the artist’s use of wiry fine lines to connect elements in the composition.

Both characteristics are strongly associated with spiritual power in historic Woodlands art. Sometimes called ‘powerlines’, undulating incised cuts found in Great Lakes war clubs and other ritual objects often show the Manitou, the Thunderbird, transferring power to a recipient. In Morrisseau’s work powerlines mark relationships, often forming closed loops. They are sometimes said to be the essential element of his images, Morrisseau’s perception of the quality of interdependence.

REFERENCES: Lister Sinclair and Jack Pollock, The Art of Norval Morrisseau (Toronto: Methuen, 1979), 53.

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DAPHNE ODJIG “We come from a strong people. We had to be strong to survive.”

– Daphne Odjig

Of Potawatomi and Odawa heritage, Daphne Odjig was born in 1919 on Wikwemikong First Nation, Manitoulin Island. Best known for fusion of traditional Indigenous painting with contemporary Western styles, Odjig is often referred to as the ”Grandmother of Indigenous Art” for her active commitment to the cultural survival and professional success of Indigenous peoples and artists in Canada.

Growing up, Odjig was a keen student, though her academic path was cut short when she contracted rheumatic fever at the age of 13. Forced to withdraw from school, Odjig would spend six months bedridden and three years infirm, finding solace in art and music.

At the age of 23, Odjig moved to Toronto with her sister Winnifred. Odjig would become enraptured with the paintings at the Royal Ontario Museum, the Art Gallery of Ontario, and the gallery at the Eaton’s College Street store, which she studied at great length in order to teach herself how to paint. Art books were also of great interest, with Picasso, Cubism and Modernism being particular favourites.

In 1945, Odjig relocated to British Columbia to marry Paul Somerville, a Mohawk/Métis Second World War veteran she met in Toronto. In 1958, the two purchased a 30-

acre farm in the Columbia Valley with plans to grow strawberries. Paul would die from injuries sustained in a car accident shortly before the harvest of their first crop. Odjig continued the couple’s plan, with the summer strawberry crops allowing for Odjig to spend her winters focused on painting and artistic experimentation.

In 1967, Odjig had her first solo exhibition at the Lakehead Art Centre in Thunder Bay, Ontario. In the following years, she was commissioned to create a number of important projects, such as a collage “Earth Mother” for the Canadian Pavilion at Expo ’70 in Osaka Japan, a large-scale mural “The Great Flood” for Peguis High School in Manitoba in 1971, and a series of illustrations for Dr. Herbert Schwarz’s book “Tales from the Smokehouse” in 1968. That same year, Odjig and her second husband, Chester Beavon, established Odjig Indian Prints of Canada Ltd. and opened a small craft shop in Winnipeg. The business expanded quickly to become the New Warehouse Gallery, the first Native-run gallery in the country.

Of her involvement in the Professional Native Indian Artists Inc, Odjig wrote “We acknowledged and supported each other as artists when the world of fine art refused us entry. There was a need for transformation in how the work of artists of Native ancestry

was understood and valued. Together we gradually broke down barriers that probably would have been so much more difficult faced alone.” 1 Odjig received numerous awards and honorary doctorates, including a Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts, the National Aboriginal Achievement Award, the Order of British Columbia, and the Order of Canada. Her works have been exhibited in the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario; the Canadian Museum of History, Gatineau, Quebec; the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Ontario; and the McMichael Canadian Art Collection in Kleinburg, Ontario.

Michelle LaVallee, ed., 7: Professional Native Indian Artists Inc. (Regina, Saskatchewan: MacKenzie Art Gallery, 2014), 77.

1

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66 DAPHNE ODJIG (1919-2016) CHILDHOOD IMAGINATIONS: OF KINGS AND QUEENS AND STUFF LIKE THAT, 1997 acrylic on canvas signed; signed, titled and dated ‘97 on the reverse; also titled to gallery label on the reverse 30.25 ins x 26.25 ins; 76.8 cms x 66.7 cms PROVENANCE:

Gallery Gevik, Toronto, ON; Private collection, Ontario $20,000–30,000 In her text on the occasion of Odjig’s retrospective at the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa, Bonnie Devine notes that that the artist’s techniques “derive from a lifelong habit of observation and her childhood years of sketching with her grandfather” as well as from her meticulous observation of the great works of Western culture, gleaned from books or studied in galleries and museums.

Devine argues that Odjig’s genius lies in “her ability to transcend the intellectual boundaries of an affected style, be it derived from Aboriginal or European tradition, and develop a personal, direct relationship to line and colour,” which begins to become evident in her work from the 1970s onwards. Though influences like Surrealism or Cubism can be noted, for Devine, “it is instead the rich pictorial tradition and carefully preserved metaphysical structure of the Anishnaabeg that inform and underpin her style. Visual art as a vehicle for communicating the abstract has been a key component in the pedagogical methodologies of the Anishinaabeg and indeed of Aboriginal cultures worldwide since ancient times.”

RELATED WORKS:

Bonnie Devine, From Resistance to Renewal: The Fine Art of Daphne Odjig. Daphne Odjig: A Retrospective Exhibition. (Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 2007), 25.

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67 DAPHNE ODJIG (1919-2016) THEY TELL US MANY THINGS, 1977 acrylic on canvas signed and dated ‘77; titled on the reverse; also titled to gallery labels on the reverse 28 ins x 24 ins; 71.1 cms x 61 cms PROVENANCE:

Pollock Gallery, Toronto, ON; Private collection, Toronto, ON; Gallery Gevik, Toronto, ON; Private collection, Ontario $12,000–18,000 Although Odjig experimented freely with her style, it is always recognizable. Cubism and Surrealism influenced her work, and while the composition with its implication of interconnectedness and cosmological layers is distinctly Nishnaabe-Neshnabe, Picasso’s touch can be felt in They Tell Us Many Things—particularly in the face of the uppermost figure.

In addition to her tremendous contributions as a visual artist, Odjig, often referred to as the ”Grandmother of Indigenous Art,” is remembered for her mentorship and support of a multitude of younger artists. They Tell Us Many Things showcases such a transfer of knowledge, perhaps between generations, or perhaps between the realms of the supernatural and the terrestrial.

This painting was purchased at the Jack Pollock Gallery when it was located on Scollard Street, Toronto, Ontario.

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68 DAPHNE ODJIG (1919-2016) UNTITLED, 1983 monotype signed to lower margin sight 28.25 ins x 20.75 ins; 71.8 cms x 52.7 cms; image 17.75 ins x 11.75 ins; 45.1 cms x 29.8 cms PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist; Private collection, Ontario $4,000–6,000 Interwoven fine lines and blended patches of transparent colour characterise this monotype, which sees Odjig’s signature style take on distinctly ethereal tones. ​​ Odjig’s son Stan Somerville recalls that “in 1983 my mother, Daphne Odjig, along with her sister Winnie, travelled to Arizona to spend a couple of weeks visiting with fellow Group of Seven artist, Joseph Sánchez. While staying with Joe, time was taken for Joe and an artist friend of his to teach my mother the technique of mono printmaking using either metal plates and/or stone tablets.”

There is an appealing symmetry to this story, as it was Odjig who launched Sánchez’s career when she published his first print in 1971. Sánchez recalls that “it was a drawing on newsprint…a first look into my psyche. I completed a newer version in 1970 and I showed it to Daphne Odjig in Winnipeg during the fall of 1971. She purchased the work and created an offset print and that in turn launched a career that continues today.”

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JOSEPH SÁNCHEZ “The strength of the group allowed me to exhibit in places I could only dream of being included.”

– Joseph Sánchez

The only non-Canadian member of the PNIAI, Joseph Sánchez was born in 1948 in Trinidad, Colorado, of Pueblo, Spanish, and German descent. Raised on the White Mountain Apache Reservation, Sánchez recalls an early affinity with art. After graduation, Sánchez briefly considered joining the priesthood, instead joining the United States Marine Corps, stationed at the El Toro UCMC Base in California, where he trained soldiers drafted for the Vietnam War. Mainly self-taught, Sánchez is known for his “spiritual surrealist” style, which the artist describes as “sensual and dreamlike, provocative and thought-inducing.”

Sánchez credits meeting Daphne Odjig in 1971 as the genesis of his artistic career.

Sánchez was living outside of Manitoba in a small town named Richer. Odjig recognized the young artist’s talent, and published an offset print based on his work. Invited to join the PNIAI, Sánchez was instrumental in its formation.

Sánchez, along with his first wife, Canadian photographer Ann Nadine Krajeck, would relocate to Arizona in the mid-1970s. In addition to his studio practice, Sánchez devoted much of his life to volunteering, advocating for the rights of minority artists, activism, public speaking, leading workshops, teaching on both elementary and university levels, curating, and writing, in addition to other multifaceted roles in the artworld. He notes that “despite occasional exhibitions, [his] energy was mostly spent supporting the careers of fellow artists.”

In 1974, Sánchez was commissioned to create a painting for the Juno Awards, to be presented to the winner of the Multiculturalism in Music category. The same year, he created “Fertility Totem,” a nine-foot cedar totem pole installed in the FrancoManitoban Center in St. Boniface, Manitoba for the Winnipeg Centennial.

In addition to his work furthering Indigenous art, Sánchez has been deeply involved with Chicano artists, forming three collectives

near Phoenix, Arizona: the Movimiento Artistic del Rio Salado (M.A.R.S.), Azoma, and Ariztlan. While travelling for work, Sánchez would meet his second wife, Margaret Burke, in Santa Fe, New Mexico in 1990. The two married in 2006.

His work has been featured in solo and group exhibitions in Canada, Mexico, England, and the United States and is held in numerous collections, including: Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada, Gatineau, Quebec; Canadian Museum of History, Gatineau, Quebec; Heard Museum, Phoenix, Arizona; Institute of American Indian Arts, Santa Fe, New Mexico; MacKenzie Art Gallery, Regina, Saskatchewan; and many private collections internationally.

Sánchez continues to curate, lecture, and educate, in addition to his work in the studio.

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69 JOSEPH SÁNCHEZ (b. 1948) THE RATTLE, 1975 oil on canvas signed and dated ‘75; signed, titled and dated to the overflap 24 ins x 20 ins; 61 cms x 50.8 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Ontario EXHIBITED:

7: Professional Native Indian Artists Inc., Mackenzie Art Gallery, Regina, SK, 21 Sep 2013 - 12 Jan 2014; Alex Janvier: Modern Indigenous Master, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, ON, 26 Nov 2016 - 17 Apr 2017 NOTE:

Accompanied by a handwritten letter from the artist $8,000–10,000 Of the painting, Sánchez writes: This painting has two major figures, myself and my first wife Ann Krajeck.

I would say this painting is about songs of protection and strength during the ‘rock & roll’ years of early fame. My wife stood behind me in the years of reverse discrimination and temptation. I honour her in this painting.

The Rattle was included in exhibitions at the Wallack Gallery in Ottawa, Ontario in 1975; the Mackenzie Art Gallery, Regina, Saskatchewan in 20132014; and at the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario in 2016-2017.

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70 JOSEPH SÁNCHEZ (b. 1948) THE RATTLE - SKETCH, 1974 graphite on paper signed, titled and dated ‘74 sight 9 ins x 12 ins; 22.9 cms x 30.5 cms PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist; Private collection, Ontario EXHIBITED:

7: Professional Native Indian Artists Inc., Mackenzie Art Gallery, Regina, SK, 21 Sep 2013 - 12 Jan 2014; Alex Janvier: Modern Indigenous Master, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, ON, 26 Nov 2016 - 17 Apr 2017 $1,000–1,500 Acquired directly from the artist, this fascinating preparatory sketch for lot 69 showcases Sánchez’s working method, and is a privileged look inside the artist’s thought process while highlighting his easy, flowing style.

The drawing depicts the central portion of the composition, the woman holding the rattle, which would form the core of the final painting.

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71 JOSEPH SÁNCHEZ (b. 1948) SELF PORTRAIT WITH MAIZ, 1976 graphite on paper signed and dated ‘76 sight 19.75 ins x 12.625 ins; 50.2 cms x 32.1 cms PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist; Private collection, Ontario $900–1,400

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Sánchez, while an integral member of the PNIAI, was also deeply involved in the arts scene of New Mexico and Arizona as an artist, activist and organiser. Leaving Manitoba, Sánchez returned to the United States in February 1975 under President Gerald Ford’s amnesty program. He would travel back and forth to visit his Canadian wife, Ann Krajeck, until she joined him in Arizona in 1978. As such, Self Portrait with Maiz, drawn in 1976, shows elements of Sánchez’s new home, as well as elements of his Pueblo and Apache heritage, the latter exemplified by the use of figural motifs found in Apache basketry.

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ALEX JANVIER “My reason for getting involved with the “Indian Group of Seven” was to take our art out of the ethnological and war museums in Ottawa, Ontario and bring it to mainstream Canada.”

- Alex Janvier

Alex Janvier was born in 1935 at Le Goff Reserve, Cold Lake First Nations, in Northern Alberta, of Denesuline and Saulteaux descent. When Janvier was eight, he was sent to Blue Quills Indian Residential School near St. Paul, Alberta.

Along with the other students, Janvier was given access to art materials, which he describes as “the one good thing” in the residential system.

As a young teenager, Janvier formed a group of local artists, which attracted the notice of University of Alberta professor Carlo Altenberg, who would tutor the artist during summer breaks for three years. Altenberg introduced Janvier to the European Modernists, particularly the work of Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee and Joan Miro, with the warning “do not read, study the pictures.” 1 Janvier went on to graduate with honours from the Provincial Institute of Technology and Art in Calgary (now the Alberta College of Art and Design) in 1960. After graduation, he became an instructor at the University of Alberta for two years before deciding to paint full-time.

A prolific artist, Janvier’s work is marked by its calligraphic lines and bright colours, producing images which fuse traditional iconography with Western motifs and techniques. Janvier often references colonization, residential schools and his own lived experience in the thousands of paintings he has produced. He notes that “Art truly is a universal language that can communicate any idea, any feeling, of anyone, regardless of their social standing, their religious beliefs or the language they speak.”

Janvier helped to bring Indigenous artists such as Norval Morrisseau and Bill Reid together for the Indians of Canada Pavilion at Expo 67, where he created the “Beaver Crossing Indian Colours (The Unpredictable East)” mural. Janvier created a number of other murals for public buildings across Canada, including “Morning Star” at the Canadian Museum of History in Ottawa. Two other notable public commissions include “Tsa Tsa Ke K’e,” or “Iron Foot Place,” at the Rogers Place in Edmonton, and “Sunrise” and “Sunset” at the Legislative Assembly of Alberta.

Janvier has made lasting contributions as a muralist, painter, activist, community leader

and educator. His works are included in public collections including the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario; the Canadian Museum of History, Gatineau, Quebec; and the McMichael Canadian Art Collection in Kleinburg, Ontario. Janvier is the recipient of many prestigious awards including the Distinguished Artist Award (2017), the Order of Canada (2007), the Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts (2008), the National Aboriginal Lifetime Achievement Award (2002), the Marion Nicoll Visual Art Award (2008) and the Alberta Order of Excellence (2010).

With his family, Janvier currently runs The Janvier Gallery, located in Cold Lake First Nations, Alberta.

Michelle LaVallee, ed., 7: Professional Native Indian Artists Inc. (Regina, Saskatchewan: MacKenzie Art Gallery, 2014), 89.

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72 ALEX JANVIER (b. 1935) SOUTHERN DENESULINE, 2004 acrylic on Arches paper signed 30.25 ins x 22.75 ins; 76.8 cms x 57.8 cms PROVENANCE:

Janvier Gallery, Cold Lake, AB; Private collection, Canmore, AB; Private collection, Ontario $6,000–8,000 Though best known for his abstract, non-representational approach, figurative as well as narrative work formed parallel tracks in Janvier’s artistic practice for decades. In Southern Denesuline, faces peer out from Janvier’s stained-glass panes of colour. The artist has commented that the work represents the entangled, interwoven relationships between people, for in Janvier’s view, everything is connected.

Chris Dueker filmed Janvier painting Southern Denesuline in preparation for a profile he wrote on the artist, “Alex Janvier’s Entangled Cartographies.” Dueker’s thesis is that Janvier’s work is cartographic, teasing out the “ties between Janvier’s brush and Dene bush.” 1 As such, there may be diasporic connotations to the abstract landscape in Southern Denesuline. Indeed, curator Elizabeth McLuhan has referred to Janvier’s paintings as “cultural topographies, maps of human irrationality and tension,” 2 and Diana Nemiroff, in summarising Janvier’s own description of his work, writes that “in retrospect, the dominant, calligraphic line appearing in all his paintings might be likened to a road that maps a journey of self-discovery.” 3 1 Chris Dueker, “Alex Janvier’s Entangled Cartographies: Hunters’ Dreams, Bauhaus Aesthetics, and the Cold Lake Air Weapons Range.” Art History, vol 34, issue 3, 2011, 549.

2 Elizabeth McLuhan, Tailfeathers/Sapp/Janvier: Selections from the Art Collection of the Glenbow Museum, (Thunder Bay: Glenbow Museum, 1982), 10.

3 Diana Nemiroff, ‘Alex Janvier’, Land, Spirit, Power: First Nations at the National Gallery of Canada, (Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 1992), 162.

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73 ALEX JANVIER (b. 1935) SKY TALK READ, 2009 watercolour on paper signed; titled and dated “July 2009” on the reverse sheet 18 ins; 45.7 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Ontario EXHIBITED:

Alex Janvier: Modern Indigenous Master, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, ON, 25 Nov 2016 - 17 Apr 2017 $6,000–8,000 Featured prominently in Janvier’s 2016-2017 travelling retrospective, Sky Talk Read with its brilliant colour and circular composition was one of the centrepieces of the exhibition. Curator Michelle LaVallee notes that Janvier’s “Indigenous sensibility sees the world in a holistic and circular way.” Janvier is well known for his masterful use of the circular format, as evidenced here. One of his most recognized works is Morning Star-Gambeh Then (1993), a monumental circular mural painted on a dome inside the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, Quebec.

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EDDY COBINESS “To me, being an artist is in itself life’s greatest gift which is an honour and to which I am greatly thankful. For many years I have worked as an artist, enjoyed it and considered it a great privilege and duty to pass on my talent to others, artists yet unborn, dreams yet unrealized.”

– Eddy Cobiness

Eddy Cobiness was born in 1933 in Warroad, Minnesota, United States and raised at the Buffalo Point Reserve, Manitoba. Cobiness served in the US Army between 1954 and 1957, where he was a Golden Gloves boxer. Largely self-taught, he enjoyed painting in watercolours in his spare time while serving in the military.

His early work involved realistic illustrations of nature and village scenes observed from his community, evolving into more abstract depictions of stylized animals and wildlife. Cobiness worked in different mediums, including oil, acrylic, ink, watercolour and coloured pencil. He took inspiration from many sources, but counted the art of celebrated Woodland artist Benjamin Chee Chee as his main influence, along with Picasso’s use of line and colour.

Cobiness was interested in depicting “the truth about the Indian people,” explaining that “people often have the wrong conception of Indian culture. They read books written by white men and often there are errors in them.” 1

Cobiness was known for signing his work with the number 47, the number being a reference to the treaty numbers that the Canadian government assigned to Indigenous people.

The artist maintained a large studio in Buffalo Point, on the shore of Lake of the Woods in Northwestern Ontario, but in 1974 was forced to move to Winnipeg, Manitoba due to health issues. Following complications from a broken hip surgery and diabetes, Cobiness died on January 1, 1996.

Cobiness’ works have been exhibited and collected worldwide, and are notably held in the collections of Queen Elizabeth II, former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien and former Manitoba Premier Edward Schreyer, as well as public collections including: Canadian Museum of History, Gatineau, Quebec; Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada, Gatineau, Quebec; McMichael Canadian Art Collection, Kleinburg, Ontario; Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, Ontario; and Woodland Cultural Centre, Brantford, Ontario.

1 Michelle Ramsay, “His Art Lives in His Soul: Inspiration Rides the Wings of Sleep” 7: Professional Native Indian Artists Inc. ed. Michelle LaVallee (Regina, Saskatchewan: MacKenzie Art Gallery, 2014), 84.

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74 EDDY COBINESS (1933-1996) HOOP DANCERS, 1975 acrylic on canvas signed and dated ‘75 36.75 ins x 49.5 ins; 93.3 cms x 125.7 cms PROVENANCE:

North Start Fine Arts, Calgary, AB; Private collection, Ontario $7,000–9,000 While hoop dancing originated as a healing dance within a ceremonial context, the performance has been popularised at cultural events as an artform and even a form of showmanship. Performed by all genders, hoops symbolise the circle of life and the interconnectedness of all things.

Cobiness was sparing with his compositions, able to convey much with few brushstrokes. Although he worked in many styles throughout his career, Hoop Dancers showcases the artist perhaps at his most elegant. Cobiness effortlessly captures the dramatic motion of two symmetrical dancers in muted natural tones. Cobiness liked this composition so much that he made several variations on the theme—he even put it on his business card.

While Cobiness drew primarily from his own Anishinaabe traditions, circular motifs figure prominently throughout central North American ritual and art.

The significance of circles among the Oglala Lakota has been poignantly articulated by Oglala medicine man Black Elk: Everything the power of the world does, is done in a circle. The sky is round and I have heard that the earth is round like a ball, and so are all the stars. The wind, in its greatest power, whirls. Birds make their nests in circles, for theirs is the same religion as ours. The sun comes forth and goes down again in a circle. Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back to where they were. The life of a man is a circle from childhood to childhood, and so it is in everything where power moves. Our tipis were round like the nest of birds, and these were always set in a circle; the nation’s hoops, a nest of many nests where the Great Spirit meant for us to hatch our children.

John G. ​​Neihardt, Black Elk Speaks: The Complete Edition, (Winnipeg: Bison Books, 2014), 121.

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JACKSON BEARDY “I paint what I believe.

What is secret I don’t paint.

- Jackson Beardy

Of Ojibwe and Cree heritage, Jackson Beardy was born the fifth of thirteen children at Garden Hill Reserve, Island Lake in Manitoba, Canada. For most of his childhood, Beardy lived with his maternal grandmother, who insisted that Beardy would become a storyteller for his people.

It was from her that he learned the history, traditions and stories of his community.

From the age of seven, Beardy attended a residential school at Portage la Prairie in Southern Manitoba. His knowledge of English was nonexistent when he started school, requiring him to learn to speak, write and read this new language. Beardy would spend years trying to untangle his identity as a result, noting that postgraduation, “I had to re-educate myself into the language, re-establish family contacts, and I had to learn to think as an Indian again…in general I didn’t fit into social circuits…then I wanted to go back and see what I could do in the white world.” 1 During his time at the residential school, Beardy discovered his interest in drawing and painting. Pursuing fine art as a career was discouraged by his teachers, but commercial art proved to be a comfortable middle ground. Beardy studied at the Winnipeg Vocational School and at the University of Manitoba. Not entirely comfortable in an academic environment, his mentor, Inuit art schular and artist

George Swinton, suggested he end his formal studies, asking “do you want a little piece of paper that says you’re an artist or do you want to be an artist?” 2 Beardy had a distinctive graphic style characterised by flat areas of warm colours and curving ribbons of paint. His early works focused on literal depictions of traditional legends, though he would shift away from this later in his career, stating that “at one time, I tried to hide behind an Indian image of the fact that my paintings were based strictly on legends. Now that I am myself, free to express the feelings that I have, I can accept the responsibility of the people I represent.

I add to the basic legends their integrity, their dignity. In that sense, I translate their oral art in a meaningful visual way.” 3 Indigenous traditions, the natural world and the interconnectivity between all beings were major themes in Beardy’s mature work.

Beardy had his first solo exhibition in 1965 at the University of Winnipeg, which led to other shows and commercial success throughout the 1960s and 1970s. In 1967, he went to Montreal as a consultant for the Canadian Indian Pavilion at Expo ‘67. That same year, he was commissioned to create pieces to commemorate the Canadian centennial and the Manitoba centennial in 1970.

Beardy spent time teaching art at Brandon University, the University of Manitoba, and

in schools across Winnipeg. In the early 1980s, Beardy lived in Ottawa, acting as an art advisor and cultural consultant to the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development.

A noted illustrator, Beardy contributed his artwork to the covers of numerous books including “Ojibwe Heritage” by Basil Johnston, “When the Morning Stars Sang Together” by John Morgan, and “Almighty Voice” by Leonard Peterson. In 1976, he was one of the artists to contribute work to the “Contemporary Native Art of Canada: The Woodland Indians” exhibit at the Royal Ontario Museum.

His work is held in numerous public and private collections, including: Canada Council Art Bank (ON); Canadian Museum of History, Gatineau, Quebec; Glenbow Museum, Calgary, Alberta; Manitoba Arts Council; McMichael Canadian Art Collection, Kleinburg, Ontario; Supreme Court of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario; Thunder Bay Art Gallery, Thunder Bay, Ontario; Windsor Castle, Berkshire, United Kingdom; and Winnipeg Art Gallery, Manitoba.

1 Michelle LaVallee ed., 7: Professional Native Indian Artists Inc. (Regina, Saskatchewan: MacKenzie Art Gallery, 2014), 107 2 Virginia Nixon “Artist Beardy Revives Tribal Culture” 7: Professional Native Indian Artists Inc. ed. Michelle LaVallee (Regina, Saskatchewan: MacKenzie Art Gallery, 2014), 111 3 Lavallee, 107

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75 JACKSON BEARDY (1944-1984) FOUR ORDERS OF LIFE, 1976 acrylic on canvas board signed and dated ‘76 sight 17.63 ins x 23.5 ins; 44.8 cms x 59.7 cms PROVENANCE:

Galerie Martal, Montreal, QC; Private collection, Toronto, ON; Private collection, Ontario EXHIBITED:

7: Professional Native Indian Artists Inc., MacKenzie Art Gallery, Regina, SK, 21 Sep 2013 - 12 Jan 2014 Accompanied by invoice from Galerie Martal, Montreal, QC $7,000–10,000 Four is a sacred number for many Great Lakes and Plains Indigenous peoples—although specific teachings vary, four is often perceived in relation to the four directions, seasons, times of day, elements, and stages of life, as well as other relationships that can be communicated in sets of four.

Included in the seminal 2013-2014 exhibition “7: Professional Native Indian Artists Inc.” at the Mackenzie Art Gallery, Regina, Saskatchewan, Beardy’s Four Orders of Life presents all elements of his composition as being deeply interrelated, as bird, fish, animal and human are offshoots of one central form. In the Woodlands style, black ‘lines of communication’ or ‘power lines’ tether the various entities, forming a superbly balanced composition, while also expressing a profound connectivity.

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76 JACKSON BEARDY (1944-1984) DESIGN FOR CREE-RED RIVER INDIAN DOLLAR, 1978 acrylic on paper signed and dated ‘78 sight 5.5 ins x 8.5 ins; 14 cms x 21.6 cms PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Ontario $2,000–3,000 Design for Cree-Red River Indian Dollar was the exact work which was the basis of the engraving for a silver dollar, minted solely in 1978. Omitted in the Beardy design seen here is the Fort Garry gate, which was engraved on the left side of the composition on the final coin. Established in 1822, Fort Garry served as the administrative and judicial hub of the Red River Colony, and was an important Hudson’s Bay trading post. By the end of 1869, Louis Riel and his Métis followers had seized the fort in the Red River Rebellion. When the city of Winnipeg was established in 1873, the name ‘Fort Garry’ fell out of use, abetted by its demolition in 1884. Only the gate of the fort remains today.

The face of Beardy’s coin depicts Chief Gordon William Lathlin (1933-1976), who served as leader of The Pas Indian Band in the 1960s, in an area known today as Opaskwayak Cree Nation. Lathlin worked to expand the band’s financial base, opening several businesses and beginning the construction of a shopping mall on the reserve. After he stepped down in 1975, Lathlin consulted for several First Nation councils and Manitoba provincial departments.

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CARL RAY “What you are looking at is ancient and sacred.

In fact, what you see could be described as a part of my soul.”

- Carl Ray

Born in 1943 at the Sandy Lake First Nation Reserve, Ontario, Carl Ray was a Cree artist, printmaker, illustrator, editor and art teacher. Ray was sent to a residential school in McIntosh, Ontario, where he discovered a desire to express himself through art, teaching himself to paint.

After leaving the school and after the death of his father, Ray began supporting himself and his family at the age of 15 through work as a hunter, logger, commercial fisherman, and miner. By his late 20s, he began painting seriously, concerning himself with preserving unrecorded traditional legends for future generations. Ray learned Ojibwe legends from his grandfather, one of the most revered medicine men in the area.

Ray left Sandy Lake to pursue work at the Red Lake gold mines, where he would contract tuberculosis. He would recover in the Fort William sanatorium, where he again turned to painting. In 1966, when he was sufficiently recovered, he returned to Sandy Lake.

Early in his career, Ray became close to Norval Morrisseau, who encouraged him to reject the traditional taboo against painting Indigenous legends. Ray would also incorporate Morrisseau’s signature X-ray style, typically using a restricted palette of only a few colours, such as brown, black and blue. Ray often depicted inner organs as well as the life force of his subjects.

With Morrisseau, Ray painted a large mural commissioned for the Indians of Canada Pavilion at Expo ‘67 in Montreal.

mural at the Sioux Lookout Fellowship and Communications Centre. In 1970, he had his first solo exhibition of his black-and-sepia Woodlands-style paintings on paper and canvas at the Aggregation Gallery in Toronto.

The gallery continued to represent his work and estate through to the early 1980s.

Ray’s blossoming career was cut short in 1978, when he died after being stabbed in a bar fight in Sioux Lookout at the age of 35.

The artist’s work is held by numerous museums, including the Canadian Museum In 1971, Ray created a group of illustrations for of History, Gatineau, Quebec, the McMichael James Stevens’ book “Legends of the Sandy Canadian Art Collection, Kleinburg, Ontario, Lake Cree.” He also illustrated the cover of the Winnipeg Art Gallery, Winnipeg, “The White City” published by Tom Marshall Manitoba, and the Royal Ontario Museum, in 1976. In 1971, Ray taught at the Manitou Arts Toronto, Ontario.

Foundation on Schreiber Island. In 1971–1972, the Department of Indian Affairs sponsored him, along with Morrisseau, to tour through northern communities and reserves.

Ray continued to paint through the mid1970s. He received several commissions to create murals at schools, including a large

77 CARL RAY (1943-1978) GROUSE, CIRCA 1970 acrylic on canvas signed; also signed in syllabics 17 ins x 23 ins; 43.2 cms x 58.4 cms PROVENANCE:

The Collection of Daphne Odjig; Hambleton Galleries, Kelowna, BC; Private collection, Ontario Accompanied by a letter from Hambleton Galleries in support of provenance $5,000–7,000

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Daphne Odjig’s son, Stan Somerville, cites this painting as having been in his mother’s collection, originally a gift from Ray. Known for his muted, minimal palette–often confining himself to two or three colours, typically brown, black and blue–the ceruleans and ultramarine pigments forming a ring around the grouse in this painting can be positioned at the far edge of Ray’s chromatic range of that time.

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t

Inuit & First Nations Art

MANASIE AKPALIAPIK THE MEETING OF TWO TRIBES

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78 GEORGE PENNIER (1957-2014), COAST SALISH LAND OTTER; SHAMAN MASK alder wood, shredded cedar bark, pigment and graphite, signed, titled on reverse 14 x 12.5 x 6.5 in — 35.6 x 31.8 x 16.5 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON $3,000—5,000 Rendered with exceptional precision and formal clarity, George Pennier has created a mask in the manner of a northern Northwest Coast carver. Once thought an essential tool of the shaman, masks could be used by the novice to call on the mysterious and little-understood powers of the mythological Land Otter, a creature referenced in the inscription on the back of Pennier’s mask.1 Such spirits were essential to help the shaman navigate the dangerous liminal space between life and death, an interaction nodded to by the upturned eyes and slackened mouth of the present mask.

A skillful blending of historic and contemporary styles, Pennier’s Land Otter, Shaman mask has benefited from the artist’s control of material and attention to subtleties of form. It is noteworthy that although of Sto:Lo Salish birth, Pennier often worked in a distinctly highNorthwest Coast style. Trained under hereditary Kwakwaka’wakw chief and artist Tony Hunt, and later studying under Kwakwaka’wakw activist and master carver Beau Dick, Pennier’s influences were diverse. This openness to cultural exchange is not without precedent on the historic Northwest Coast, where the exchange of styles, and even ritual objects among otherwise largely distinct peoples has occurred in several documented instances.2 Important examples of Pennier’s sculpture are rare to market, although a small number of his works may be viewed in the collections of public institutions such as Burke Museum, Seattle, and the Seattle Art Museum.

1 Allen Wardwell, Tangible Visions: Northwest Coast Indian Shamanism and its Art, (New York: Monacelli Press, 2009), 109.

2 Mary Malloy, Souvenirs of the First Trade: Northwest Coast Art and Artifacts Collected by American Mariners, 1788-1844, (Massachusetts: Peabody Press, 2012)

RELATED WORKS:

Burke Museum, Cat. No. 2004-2/153—See: Robin K. Wright and Kathryn Bunn-Marcuse, In the Spirit of the Ancestors: Contemporary Northwest Coast Art at the Burke Museum, (Washington: University of Washington Press, 2015), 104.

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79 RICHARD HUNT, O.C., O.B.C. (b. 1951), KWAKWAKA' WAKW KOMOKWA (WEALTHY ONE) MASK red cedar, pigment, signed and inscribed with title 9.5 x 6.75 x 5.25 in — 24.1 x 17.1 x 13.3 cm PROVENANCE:

Seahawk Auctions, Burnaby, BC, 3 April, 2016, lot 92; Private collection, Ontario $2,000—3,000 A mask of exquisite composition and an inventive but traditionally informed style, it represents Komokwa, whose name translates as “wealthy one,” or more literally “copper-maker,” the powerful ruler of the undersea who inhabits an underwater palace filled with abundant treasure. A part of the legends of the Kwakwaka’wakw and Nuxalk First Nations, Komokwa is believed to control the rise and fall of the tides, as well as being the master of the seal and sea lion population.1 Komokwa is sometimes thought to have the ability to confer great wealth, as he may return other gifts, objects once thrown in the water as evidence of wealth and prestige by highranking members of the community during potlatch ceremonies.

Richard Hunt was born a Kwaguilth of the Kwakwaka’wakw Nation in Alert Bay. Descended from a high-ranking lineage, his family has been important both in the Alert Bay Kwakwaka’wakw community, and to the larger study and preservation of Indigenous Northwest Coast traditions.

The son of artist and hereditary chief Henry Hunt, brother of Tony and Stanley C. Hunt, and the grandson of the celebrated Mungo Martin, on his father’s side Richard is descended from George Hunt. Notably George Hunt was employed to assist in fieldwork by anthropologist Franz Boas, and is now deservedly considered a pioneering and important linguist and ethnologist in his own right.2 1 Cheryl Shearar, Understanding Northwest Coast Art, A Guide to Crests, Beings and Symbols, (Washington: University of Washington Press, 2008), 65.

2 Douglas Cole, Captured Heritage, The Scramble for Northwest Coast Artefacts, (Washington: University of Washington Press, 1985), 156-163.

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80 AUGUSTUS BEAN (KH’ALYAAN EESH, KEITXUT’CH) (1852-1926), RUDOLPH WALTON (KAAWOOTK’, AAK’WAATSEEN) (1867-1951), TLINGIT HOOTZ-TSIK; A DISH IN THE BEAR’S NEST maple wood, abalone, ivory, beads, unsigned, ca. 1884 6.25 x 16 x 7.27 in — 15.9 x 40.6 x 18.5 cm PROVENANCE:

Admiral Charles H. Rockwell (1840-1908), thence by descent; Richard Bahnman, British Columbia; Private collection, Ontario NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $4,500—6,500

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Feast dishes played an important role in historic Northwest culture. Often elaborately carved and decorated, they were important heirlooms and an essential component in ceremony proclaiming social status and clan affiliation, and relaying traditional narratives. Bowls among the Tlingit sometimes bore individual names, and themselves could be subject to stories and histories documented in ritual and song.

By the late nineteenth century, European and Euro-American incursion on the Coast resulted in changes to traditional practices, and in the separation of countless heirlooms from their associated names and stories. Within this shifting environment, individuals found ways of documenting and adapting tradition, as is evident here in this remarkable Tlingit feast bowl, one of a number of examples identified as the work of Augustus Bean, and his brother-in-law Rudolph Walton.

High-ranking members of Sitka families and respected leaders in their community, both Bean and Walton are remembered for their challenges to American legal authorities, contribution to the so-called ‘Last Potlatch’ of 1904, and for carving objects for ritual and ceremonial use, and traditionally informed objects for sale to Euro-American collectors and institutions.1 In 1926 Rudolph Walton said of a “Hootz-tsik” or bear feasting bowl closely related to the present example and acquired from the artist by the Sheldon Jackson Museum in Sitka, Alaska: “This is the kind of dish the old hunter used. His name was Kotz. Long time ago he was captured by the Bears and married into the Bear tribe. Later on he had sons and daughters, half men, half bear. This kind of dish he used, a dish in the Bear’s Nest.”2 The present bowl’s first known owner was Admiral Charles H. Rockwell (1840-1908).3 Rockwell was stationed in Sitka as Lieutenant Commander of the U.S.S. Jamestown, the sole American administrative body in the region between 1878 and 1884.4 Augustus Bean and the younger Rudolph Walton were both well known to Navy and government representatives in the region as early as 1894 and would have been in close proximity to Rockwell during his stay in the region when the present bowl was likely sold or gifted to him.5 1 Zachary R. Jones, “Haa Leelk’w Has Ji.Eeti, Our Grandparents’ Art: A Study of Master Tlingit Artists, 1750-1989,” PdD. PdD. Dissertation University of Alaska Fairbanks, 2018. p. 129-135 and 163-171 2 Joyce Walton Shales, “Rudolph Walton: One Tlingit Man’s Journey Through Stormy Seas Sitka, Alaska, 1867-1951.”

PhD. Thesis, University of British Columbia, 1998. p. 105 3 Gailia Mackenzie (Great Granddaughter of Admiral Charles H. Rockewell), letter to John Livingston, March 9, 2015.

4 Robert D.B. Carlisle, Chatham’s Admiral, Charles H. Rockwell, (Chatham: Stage Neck Publications, 2002), 127.

5 Jones, 130.

RELATED WORKS:

Saint Louis Art Museum, Col. No. 275:1982. Click Here to read more British Museum, Col. No. Am1976,03.12. Click Here to read more Alaska State Museum, Col. No. II-B-1010—see: Jones, Zachary R. “Haa Leelk’w Has Ji.Eeti, Our Grandparents’ Art: A Study of Master Tlingit Artists, 1750-1989,” PhD. Dissertation, University of Alaska Fairbanks, 2018. 133, pl. 119-129, 135, pl. 121

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81 RAYMOND STEVENS (1953-1981), HAIDA FROG PENDANT sterling silver, signed, 1978 1.25 x 1 in — 3.2 x 2.5 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Ontario $800—1,200 The adopted son of renowned late 20th century Haida artist Bill Reid and his wife Mabel Stevens, Raymond Stevens (born Raymond Cross) was an exceptionally talented artist working in argillite and silver. His work gained significant recognition during his lifetime despite his early and tragic death at the age of 28. Raymond’s biological parents were Nisga’a and Haida. 1 At a young age he was exposed to the teachings of the important Haida artist Rufus Moody, as well as Robert Cross, and his biological brother Nelson Cross.

Stevens’ compositions are characterised by exquisite crosshatching and fine detail. Of the small body of work produced during his lifetime, several examples of his silver pieces are held in the Museum of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, and The Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, Quebec. Artworks by Stevens were included in the celebrated 2006 Vancouver Art Gallery exhibition Raven Travelling: Two Centuries of Haida Art. Working in a tradition of silver craft first established by Haida Chief Charles Edenshaw in the nineteenth century, here Stevens has produced a superbly composed pendant on a small scale bearing the image of a frog. The frog is heavily associated with Shamanism throughout the Northwest Coast, but has specific significance in Haida culture as a crest symbol of the Eagle moiety, where it is said to be a force of stability when carved on house poles.2 1 Iljuwas Bill Reid. n.d. Art Canada Institute - Institut de l’Art Canadien. Click here to read more 2 Hilary Stewart, Looking at Indian Art of the Northwest Coast. (Vancouver/Toronto: Douglas & MacIntyre, 1981), 68.

RELATED WORKS:

Museum of Anthropology, University of British Columbia, Cat. No. 3260/277, Click here to read more Museum of Anthropology, University of British Columbia, Cat. No. 3260/233, Click here to read more Canadian Museum of History, Cat. No. VII-B-1757.

Click here to read more

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82 UNIDENTIFIED ARTIST, HAIDA HAIDA MODEL TOTEM POLE red cedar, pigment, ca. 1910 10 x 4.5 x 3.12 in — 25.4 x 11.4 x 7.9 cm PROVENANCE:

Richard & Maureen Bahnman, British Columbia; Private collection, Ontario $2,500—3,500 In the late 1880s an influx of trade in the Pacific Northwest sparked the genesis of the model totem pole, the earliest prolific carvers of which were the Haida People of Haida Gwaii (previously Queen Charlotte Islands).1 Working both in carbonaceous shale and wood, Haida carvers produced models for sale and trade to Euro and Euro-American visitors. The models were embellished with the complex language of crests and emblems that allude to foundational Northwest Coast mythology.

The present totem pole, characterised by well formed high-relief carving and a restrained and muted paint palette, is typical of late 19th and early 20th century, or so-called “emergent phase” production. Although wooden poles of this period are rarely attributable to known makers, this pole’s distinct greyish-white colour makes a Kaigani Haida carver a likely point of origin.

Michael D. Hall and Pat Glascock, Carving and Commerce, Model Totem Poles 1880-2010, (Washington: University of Washington Press, 2011), 57.

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83 JESSIE OONARK ᔪᓯ ᐃᓇ, O.C., R.C.A. (1906-1985), QAMANI’TUAQ (BAKER LAKE) UNTITLED (FIGURE WITH FACES) duffle, felt, embroidery floss, and thread, signed, ca. 1979 46.5 x 30.5 in — 118.1 x 77.5 cm PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist, Baker Lake, 1981 $30,000—40,000 An artist of exceptionally fertile imagination and seemingly boundless creative energy, Jessie Oonark produced a truly remarkable body of drawings, prints and nivingajuliat (wall hangings) over her long career. Creating images sometimes formal in their symmetry but always subjective and impressionistic, Oonark has cited childhood memories as inspiration for her work.1 A departure from conventions of square and rectangular presentation, the present remarkable nivingajuliatt is perhaps the most striking example from a period of experimentation which started in the mid-1970s in which Oonark investigated a series of unconventional nivingajuliat profiles, including ulus, human figures, and even objects such as snow beaters.2 Acquired directly from the artist during a year-long stay in Qamani’tuaq (Baker Lake) in 1981, the consignor recalls her encounters with Jessie Oonark: “The men taught me and my then-partner how to hunt caribou which was to be our main food source. But it was the women who embraced me and showed me how to tan the hides and then to sew a parka from a caribou I shot and skinned…it was here in the circle of women that I met Jessie Oonark. The women and children would gather to talk and laugh, drink tea and work together tanning hides and sewing them with sinew. Jessie was one of the elders and respected as such. I still have fond memories of her lovely smile. Jessie did not speak English and my Inuktitut was that of a young child. Through translation of the younger women I heard her stories about living on the land. She told me that she could fly…especially at night.”3 In storage since its purchase in 1981, the present work has been preserved in unusually exceptional condition.

For a closely related example exhibited in the 1986 Winnipeg Art Gallery Jessie Oonark Retrospective, please see: Jean Blodgett and Marie Bouchard. Jessie Oonark: A Retrospective.

Winnipeg: Winnipeg Art Gallery, 1986. p. 128, pl. 68 1 Jo Carson, “Toronto Atmosphere Offends The Artist from Baker Lakes”, The Globe and Mail, April, 3, 1971.

2 Jean Blodgett and Marie Bouchard. Jessie Oonark: A Retrospective. (Winnipeg: Winnipeg Art Gallery, 1986), 65.

3 Personal correspondence with the consignor, March 6, 2022.

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84 JESSIE OONARK ᔪᓯ ᐃᓇ, O.C., R.C.A. (1906-1985), QAMANI’TUAQ (BAKER LAKE) UNTITLED (COMPOSITION WITH DANCING FIGURES) stroud, thread, embroidery floss, signed in syllabics, ca. 1971 17.5 x 16.75 in — 44.5 x 42.5 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Yukon $10,000—15,000 Rich in detail, and vibrant in colour, the present work is an outstanding example of nivingajuliat (wall hanging) likely dating to the artist’s early 1970s period. A master of symmetry and compositional balance, Oonark loses little if any of the power of her larger works in this intimate and striking textile.

An artist whose imagery often reflected events and objects from her childhood, she sometimes cited memory as inspiration for her work, evident here in the inclusion of facial tattoos of a type already oldfashioned at the time of Oonark’s youth, and which the artist herself refused to receive.1, 2 1 Jean Blodgett and Marie Bouchard. Jessie Oonark: A Retrospective. (Winnipeg: Winnipeg Art Gallery, 1986), 9.

2 Lars Krutak, Tattoo Traditions of Native North America: Ancient and Contemporary Expressions of Identity, (Volendam: LM Publishers, 2014), 19.

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t MANASIE AKPALIPIK We are pleased to present six exceptional works by Manasie Akpaliapik in this auction. Purchased directly from the artist in the mid-late 1990s, each represents a significant element of the artist’s practice, exemplifying the fertility of imagination and astounding range of technical skill for which he has become known.

An important work by Manasie, Two Headed Caribou Women is an achievement by the artist on a monumental scale. A sculpture of remarkable detail and sensitivity to material, it was made in a period associated with some of Manasie’s most exceptionally inventive and finely carved works. Almost a decade after the tragic death of his wife and two children, Manasie embarked on a trip to Arctic Bay in 1989 to learn drum dancing, kayak making, and collect stories told by community elders.1 In the years following, Manasie produced many of his best-known works. Alive with visions of interconnectedness and continuity, in the 1990s Manasie’s sculptural insights have, in the words of George Swinton, made “Manasie the contemporary Inuit artist par excellence.” 2 Studded with images inspired by Inuit ceremony and tradition, the sculpture bears strong thematic and compositional similarities to a more 298 The Canada Auction

modestly proportioned sculpture, titled Respecting the Circle (20.5 inches high, 28 inches wide, by 16 inches deep) exhibited in the landmark 1990 Winnipeg Art Gallery exhibition of the artist’s work, and later gifted to the Art Gallery of Ontario by Samuel and Esther Sarick.3 Both sculptures are carved from a portion of a whale’s skull and are composed around the foramen magnum (the opening where the spine enters the skull).

As in Respecting the Circle, each nook and outcropping in Two Headed Caribou Women offers a multiplicity of images and vantage points, however, whereas in the former sculpture the two central human faces appear divided by an owl and contorted in inexplicable agony, in the present sculpture the figures appear with a mutual body, engaged in iqiruktuk (mouth-pull), a traditional game of strength and a shared feat of endurance.

1 Claire Keating, “Inuit Master Works By Manasie Akpaliapik,” Claire Keating Authorised Representative, pamphlet, 1999.

2 George Swinton, “The Art of Manasie Akpaliapik: A Review Essay,” Inuit Art Quarterly.

Spring 1991, vol. 6 no. 2. p. 42-45.

3 Kendall Blanchard, The Anthropology of Sport, An Introduction, (Connecticut: Greenwood Publishing Group, 1995), 149.

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85 MANASIE AKPALIAPIK ᒪᓇᓯ ᐊᐸᓕᐊᐱ (b. 1955), IKPIARJUK (ARCTIC BAY) TWO HEADED CARIBOU WOMAN whalebone, stone, catlinite, antler, signed in syllabics, ca. 1995 39 x 36.5 x 14.5 in — 99.1 x 92.7 x 36.8 cm PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist, ca. 2000 NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $40,000—60,000 VIEW THIS LOT

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86 MANASIE AKPALIAPIK ᒪᓇᓯ ᐊᐸᓕᐊᐱ (b. 1955), IKPIARJUK (ARCTIC BAY) THE MEETING OF TWO TRIBES stone, ivory, antler, no readily visible signature, ca. 1995 23.5 x 22.5 x 11 in — 59.7 x 57.2 x 27.9 cm PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist, ca. 2000 NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $6,000—8,000 Complex in its composition, bristling with fine detail, and monumental in scale, The Meeting of Two Tribes clearly proclaims Manasie’s mastery of carving in stone as much as in whalebone.

Liberated from the inherent confines of bone, in The Meeting of Two Tribes Manasie has been free to develop to the utmost the circular compositions that recur throughout his work –appearing prominently in lots 85 and 87 of this auction.

A central face on each of the two sides of the sculpture anchors the composition, each stare out at the viewer with expressive bloodshot eyes. One is that of a man, his face pierced with two figural labrets, the other, the face of a woman, tattooed and unnaturally round. She is adorned with mask-like protrusions in the form of flippers and the effigy of a seal. Surrounding the faces are a large walrus, an owl, and the head over a bear, resting over the partially concealed face of a man.

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87 MANASIE AKPALIAPIK ᒪᓇᓯ ᐊᐸᓕᐊᐱ (b. 1955), IKPIARJUK (ARCTIC BAY) SHAMAN TRANSFORMATION whalebone, catlinite, stone, ivory, signed in syllabics, ca. 1995.

15.25 x 23.75 x 8.5 in — 38.7 x 60.3 x 21.6 cm PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist, ca. 2000 NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $4,000—6,000 In Shaman Transformation, one side of a Janus-like composition is the face of a redeyed creature emerging from a surround of bone atop an implied earth-like sphere of open space. The being wields the implements of the shaman, a drum and beater.

Above the creature hovers a relief-carved sun and moon—imagery in shamanic masks of the Western Arctic that is often symbolic of the firmament.1 Turning to the other side of the composition, the viewer is greeted by two dispassionate faces staring out at them. The figures follow the curvature of the porous and pitted bone from which they emerge. On this side of the composition, the circular drum of the shaman is adorned with a face, suspended in mid-air by the mysterious figures posed around the central void.

1 Dorothy Jean Ray, Eskimo Masks Art and Ceremony, (Seattle & London: University of Washington Press, 1975), 67.

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88 MANASIE AKPALIAPIK ᒪᓇᓯ ᐊᐸᓕᐊᐱ (b. 1955), IKPIARJUK (ARCTIC BAY) WOMEN AND ATTENDANT SPIRITS whalebone vertabrae, bone, unsigned, ca. 1995 16 x 26.5 x 9.25 in — 40.6 x 67.3 x 23.5 cm PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist, ca. 2000 NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $3,000—4,000 In an iconic image for the artist, exquisitely sculpted from time-weathered bone, Janus-like faces emerge from each side of a vertebra of a whale. Perhaps in a state of transformation, the transverse processes or outswept fins of the vertebra invoke the budding flippers of a seal or walrus. The truncated right flipper is the perch for a small vertebra housing diminutive attendant spirits.

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89 MANASIE AKPALIAPIK ᒪᓇᓯ ᐊᐸᓕᐊᐱ (b. 1955), IKPIARJUK (ARCTIC BAY) MUSK OX whalebone, antler, signed in syllabics, ca. 1995.

9 x 13.75 x 5.75 in — 22.9 x 34.9 x 14.6 cm PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist, ca. 2000 NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $4,000—6,000 Manasie has approached this iconic Arctic subject with the same eye for detail and inventive use of material that characterises his treatment of more fantastical subjects. The natural porosity of the whalebone has been exploited into shallow furrows implying the wind-swept hide of the creature.

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90 MANASIE AKPALIAPIK ᒪᓇᓯ ᐊᐸᓕᐊᐱ (b. 1955), IKPIARJUK (ARCTIC BAY) MASK WITH SEAL SPIRIT catlinite, whalebone, stone, signed in syllabics, ca. 1995 14.25 x 12.25 x 2.5 in — 36.2 x 31.1 x 6.4 cm PROVENANCE:

Acquired directly from the artist, ca. 2000 NOTE:

The mask in this sculpture has been carved from an exceptional slab of naturally occurring red catlinite, a stone with sacred associations, long employed primarily by central North American Indigenous peoples in the fabrication of bowls for ceremonial smoking pipes.

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $2,500—3,500 Carved in low relief, in Mask with Seal Spirit, Manasie, working with shamanic imagery traditional to the Western Arctic, has carved a representation of a mask bedecked with an attendant spirit. Two outswept hands flank an image of a seal, each with incised circles on their palms.

Such circular engravings on appendages are often present on shamanic masks. In 1880 during his time among the Indigenous inhabitants of the Bering Strait, Edward Wilson Nelson recorded that the “hole was placed in the palm so that the spirit of a bird would release the game, permitting the hunter to obtain it.” 1 The mask-like form has been carved from an exceptional slab of naturallyoccurring red catlinite, a stone with sacred associations, long employed primarily by central North American Indigenous peoples in the fabrication of bowls for ceremonial smoking pipes.

1 Dorothy Jean Ray, Eskimo Masks Art and Ceremony, (Seattle & London: University of Washington Press, 1975), 67.

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91 EGEVADLUQ RAGEE ᐃᔨᕙᓗ (1920-1983), KINNGAIT (CAPE DORSET) WOMAN WITH BRAIDS stone, signed in Roman, ca. 1960 10.5 x 4.75 x 2.75 in — 26.7 x 12.1 x 7 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Ontario $12,000—14,000 Known for the exuberant and often fantastical compositions found in her early prints, and for her later pioneering use of acrylics in Kinngait, Egevadluq is less recognized for her sculpture, perhaps because so few examples of her early work are known.1 The present sculpture Women with Braids, dates to the early 1960s, a period when the artist’s output was every bit the equal of her male Kinngait contemporaries, including master sculptors Osuitok Ipeelee, Sheokjuk Oqutaq, and Kiawak Ashoona. Stylistically defined by the artist’s gift for interplay between simplicity of form and crisply rendered fine detail, the sculpture is a joy to behold.

1 CWAHI, “Ragee, Egevadluq,” Canadian Women Artists Initiative, Accessed, April 22, 2022, Click here to read more

RELATED WORKS:

Waddington’s, 15 June, 2015. Click here to read more

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JOHN TIKTAK Tiktak began sculpting after suffering a serious injury in a nickel mine in Kangiqsliniq (Rankin Inlet). In 1963 he committed himself to being a professional artist, beginning a body of work both startlingly consistent and original in vision. Pioneering Inuit art scholar and author George Swinton was quick to recognize Tiktak’s prodigious talents and the similarity of his work to the English artist Henry Moore. In 1966 Swinton wrote in Canadian Art: “[Tiktak] is primitive like Henry Moore, or Wotruba. That is to say, his sophistication of form is such that he arrives at primal shapes. And his communication is such that he requires the most elemental statements in content and form: he communicates elemental matter through primal form. Yet in this very simplicity he achieves a sophistication that comes only from struggle with thought and its distillation into form. It is precisely in this regard that he resembles Moore.” 1 While stylistic similarities between Tiktak and Moore might suggest a related approach to a shared craft, in the case of Tiktak, the motivations for his subject matter were purely Inuit as indicated by Bernadette Driscoll: “Symbolised by the mother’s amautik (parka), the maternal bond is an exceptionally visual image in Inuit life. Carried within the amautik, the child spends the first years of life in intimate contact with his or her mother. Tiktak uses the Inuit concept of amariik—the joining of mother and child as natural union—in each of his carving dealing with maternity…The strength of the maternal bond has been noted as an important influence in the artist’s own life.” 2 In the present work, Tiktak has approached the subject of the mother and child sparing none of the forceful intensity for which his work is known. Muscular, and even raw in style, the tone is nonetheless one of compassion and care. The two smiling faces look out at the world around them, the mother with affection, and the child in apparent wonder and curiosity.

1 George Swinton, Artists from the Keewatin in Canadian Art (April 1966: 32-34), 34.

2 Bernadette Driscoll, Rankin Inlet /Kangirlliniq, (Ottawa: Winnipeg Art Gallery, 1981), quoted in Auger, Emily E., The Way of Inuit Art, Aesthetics and History in and Beyond the Arctic, (North Carolina: McFarland & Company Inc., 2005), 117.

RELATED WORKS: Private Collection–See: Norman Zepp, Pure Vision, The Keewatin Spirit, (Regina: Norman Mackenzie Art Gallery University of Regina, 1986), p. 98, pl. 44 Waddington’s May, 28, 2019, lot 44. Click here to read more

92 JOHN TIKTAK ᔭᓐ ᑎᑕ, R.C.A. (1916-1981), KANGIQLINIQ (RANKIN INLET) MOTHER AND CHILD stone, signed in syllabics, ca. 1980 11.75 x 9 x 4 in — 29.8 x 22.9 x 10.2 cm PROVENANCE:

North of Sixty Art Ltd., St. Andrews, NB; Private collection, Oakville, ON $20,000—30,000

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93 t ENNUTSIAK ᐃᓄᓯᐊ (1896-1967), IQALUIT (FROBISHER BAY) WOMEN PREPARING SKINS stone, ivory, unsigned, disc number inscribed 5 x 5 x 4.5 in — 12.7 x 12.7 x 11.4 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, British Columbia NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $4,000—6,000 Originally from the Nunavik region (Arctic Quebec), Ennutsiak lived most of his life on the land before settling in Iqaluit (Frobisher Bay) where he became an active community leader.1 Ennutsiak was exceptional both for his descriptive treatment of his subject matter and for his carving of complex and detailed multi-figure tableaus. His migration boats are perhaps the only examples whose detail and lifelike air rival those of master sculptor Joe Talirunili. Ennutsiak’s style was a significant departure from the work of many, if not all, of his contemporaries, and has garnered significant interest on the market beginning in the late years of his life and continuing through to today.

In this exceptionally refined work, Ennutsiak gives us an image of women at work preparing skins with ivory awls. Through Ennutsiak’s eyes, the communal scene becomes one of visual and thematic harmony. Four seal skins are attached around a central pole, and around them are four women in matching costumes with hoops of braided hair. At the centre of the composition, stone has been cut away in a complex and startlingly difficult to execute series of undercuts that make clear the artist’s virtuoso skill.

It is worth noting that Ennutsiak, in addition to his artistic achievements, was the patriarch of an important line of Iqaluit sculptors, and father of the talented and prolific artist Nooveeya Ipellie.2 1 Inuit Art Foundation, “Ennutsiak”, IAF, Accessed April 17, 2022. Click here to read more 2 Jean Blodgett. Grasp Tight The Old Ways: Selections from The Klamer Family Collection of Inuit Art, (Toronto: Art Gallery of Ontario, 1983), 165.

RELATED WORKS:

Katilvik, Waddington’s September 16, 2020, lot 33. Click here to read more Canadian Museum of History, Col. No. IV-C-5980. Click here to read more 316 The Canada Auction

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JOE TALIRUNILI t

Outspoken and energetic in life and art, Joe Talirunili created a highly distinctive and significant body of artwork over his long career, representing both his outlook and his remarkable and sometimes harrowing life experiences.

In a 1977 interview with Johnny Pov documented in Marybelle Myers’ landmark monograph Joe Talirunili: A Grace Beyond the Reach of Art, Pov recollects Joe Talirunili’s fondness for people and penchant for storytelling.1 There are perhaps few Inuit artists whose work has been so strongly and rightfully associated with narrative as Talirunili, and no subject in Talirunili’s oeuvre is more emblematic of his predilection than the remarkable series of Migration Boats that he began representing in carving and graphics and documenting in accompanying notes as early as 1964.

Exhibiting Talirunili’s attention to detail in the faces of the figures and lack of damage to extremities, the present sculpture is also exceptional for its air of comparative calm and apparent order. Figures inside the boat are laid out with relative symmetry. A harpooner stationed at the front of the craft, adjacent to an oarsman stands posed for a throw, the two figures neatly divided by a protruding avataq (sealskin float). The boat’s occupants are tucked down behind the gunnels of the craft, deemphasizing the sense of overcrowding and chaotic energy present in later examples. Even the positioning of the women and children speaks of order and control: most are placed in the centre of the craft, whereas in other iterations, children teem out from under and between the oarsmen.

The present sculpture is a remarkably early version of the Migration Boat subject. Dating circa 1965, it was purchased by its original owner on November 23, 1966 from the Povungnituk Cooperative Society (4 ruelles des Ursulines, Quebec City). Documented the same year by Vie des Arts photographer Albert Kilbertus, the sculpture has passed from the previous owner by descent, and appears now largely as it did in 1966, including Talirunili’s original pressed fibre-board harpoon.4

While the empirical details of the migrations Talirunili endured remain unknown to us, Talirunili’s personality and experience of these trials can be encountered anew upon viewing each of his varied Migration Boats.

Documented time and again up until the last years of his life, the sculptures are sometimes subject to haphazard repairs and modifications.2 All are witness to the intimacy of subjective memory, and inexhaustible creative drive of the artist.

1 Marybelle Myers, Joe Talirunili: A Grace Beyond the Taliruili’s records of his experiences change over time and shift in emphasis. Lists of the occupants of the boats vary over the years, as do the names of the survivors that sometimes accompanied the sculptures. In the years before his death Talirunili’s carvings became less detailed, diminishing in refinement.

Seemingly undaunted, the artist re-approached the subject of the Migration Boat with increasing rapidity, perhaps in an attempt to recall as much as he could of the event in years of flagging memory.3 318 The Canada Auction

Reach of Art, (Quebec: La Federation des cooperatives du Nouveau-Quebec, 1977), 7.

2 Myers, 4.

3 Myers, 4.

4 Albert Kilbertus photograph and accompanying notation, and Povungnituk Cooperative Society receipt, November 23, 1966.

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94 JOE TALIRUNILI ᔪᐅ ᑕᓚᕈᓂᓕ (1893-1976), PUVIRNITUQ (POVUNGNITUK) MIGRATION BOAT stone, ivory, bone, sinew, pressed fibre-board, signed in Roman, ca. 1969 2.62 x 13 x 3.75 in — 6.7 x 33 x 9.5 cm PROVENANCE:

Povungnituk Cooperative Society, 23 November, 1966, Quebec; Private collection, Montreal, QC, thence by decent NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $150,000—250,000

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95 JOE TALIRUNILI ᔪᐅ ᑕᓚᕈᓂᓕ (1893-1976), PUVIRNITUQ (POVUNGNITUK) HUNTERS LOST IN ICEBERGS WHILE HUNTING SEALS stonecut, 1975, 37/50, unframed 24.5 x 27.5 in — 62.2 x 69.9 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Hamilton, ON $1,000—2,000 One of the first Inuit artists to experiment with printmaking, Talirunili’s work was included in most Puvirnituq (Povungnituk) collections. A total of 73 of his prints, some uncatalogued, have been put onto the market since 1962.1 Marybelle Myers notes in Joe Talirunili: A Grace Beyond the Reach of Art, that in the early 1970s Talirunili’s energy and interest in artmaking seemed to be flagging. However in 1974 he underwent an unexpected resurgence of energy, producing four stonecuts for the 1975 Povungnituk print collection, of which the present print is included. Talirunili would go on to make more than 35 remarkable sculptures for an exhibition in Toronto, followed by further creations in 1976, before his death later that year. 2 Hunters Lost In Icebergs While Hunting Seals is a classic Talirunili composition. Full of epic imagery and the iconic, perhaps supernatural presence of owls—a favoured subject for the artist–the print is dense with narrative detail. The work is a surprisingly lively late iteration of his many images of trials by ocean and boat.

1 Marybelle Myers, Joe Talirunili: A Grace Beyond the Reach of Art, (Quebec: La Federation des cooperatives du Nouveau-Quebec, 1977), 5.

2 Myers, 6.

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96 JESSIE OONARK ᔪᓯ ᐃᓇ, O.C., R.C.A. (1906-1985), QAMANI’TUAQ (BAKER LAKE) WOMAN stonecut, 1970, 48/50, unframed 31 x 21.5 in — 78.7 x 54.6 cm PROVENANCE:

Estate of W.A. Ross MacFadden, Toronto, ON NOTE:

This image was chosen for the cover of the 1970 Baker Lake catalogue. $5,000—7,000 Sarah Milroy notes in Jessie Oonark, Flashback, written for Inuit Art Quarterly in March 2018, that Oonark’s use of “often dramatic dislocations of scale in the service of emphasis—an approach unfamiliar to European eyes accustomed to three-point perspective. In Oonark’s world, scale speaks not of foreground proximity but of importance…the whole is understood, with Oonark indulging an emphatic pictorial shorthand that is all the more expressive for its economy.” Accordingly, we can read Oonark’s Women as vital forces, larger than life in terms of both scale and importance.1 1 Sarah Milroy, “Jessie Oonark, Flashback”, Inuit Art Quarterly, Accessed April 24, 2022, Click here to read more

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97 KANANGINAK POOTOOGOOK ᑲᓇᒋᓇ ᐳᑐᒍᑭ, R.C.A. (1935-2010), KINNGAIT (CAPE DORSET) RUNNING CARIBOU stonecut, 1958, 3/30, framed and glazed 6 x 8 in — 15.2 x 20.3 cm PROVENANCE:

Waddington’s Auctioneers, Toronto, ON, December, 1982; Private collection, Ontario $4,000—6,000

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This exceptional composition by Kananginak is among the earliest prints made in Kinngait, pre-dating the first annual Cape Dorset print release in 1960. Credited with introducing printmaking to the North, artist and public administrator James Houston worked with local Kinngait artists, such as Osuitok Ipeelee and Kananginak Pootoogook to produce a small number of experimental prints in 1957 and 1958 which were released for sale to a limited test market in the fall of 1958.

Dedicated to his craft as well as his community, and confident that printmaking programs would bring much needed economic opportunity, Pootoogook became the first spokesperson of the West Baffin Eskimo Co-operative and eventually became president of the Board of Directors.1 A brilliant printmaker and talented artist, Pootoogook’s gift for the humour of incongruity, and the power of stilled movement pervade many of his works. Here in this early print the artist has imbued his subject with proud majesty, and the composition with a sense of radiant calm.

1 IAF, “Kananginak Pootoogook”, Inuit Art Foundation, Accessed April 23, 2022.

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98 JESSIE OONARK ᔪᓯ ᐃᓇ, O.C., R.C.A. (1906-1985), QAMANI’TUAQ (BAKER LAKE) SPIRITS MAKING A WISH stencil, 1978, 23/39, archivally framed and glazed Sight 21.5 x 29.5 in — 54.6 x 74.9 cm

In this playful image, two spirits frolic in bird-like attire, balanced in delightfully offkilter symmetry, they exemplify Oonark’s gift for maintaining compositional balance without the loss of sometimes whimsical eccentricity.

PROVENANCE:

Marion Scott Gallery, Vancouver, BC; Private collection, Florida NOTE:

Please note that this lot is accompanied by a photocopy of the invoice from Marion Scott Gallery. $2,000—3,000 VIEW THIS LOT

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t ANDY MIKI Simple in form and concentrated in their emotive power, Andy Miki’s sculptures are masterworks of twentieth century abstraction. While littleappreciated during Miki’s lifetime, interest has steadily grown since the artist’s passing in 1982, and significant examples are increasingly rare on the market.

Miki’s sculptures suggest creatures from our world, and yet deny readily identification. While some appear familiar, others, as here, seem more like a shadow of something that we know rather than anything that we are likely to encounter.

The present work is among the most abstract of a series of compositionally-related sculptures by the artist, and is among the largest documented from this period and of this style. Carved in light stone with a hard-wearing soot-blackened finish, the surface of the work is characterised by scattershot fine lines and tool marks.

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t99

ANDY MIKI ᒥᑭ (1918-1983), ARVIAT (ESKIMO POINT) COMPOSITION WITH TWO FIGURES stone, unsigned, ca. 1970, inscribed: P / 11061-2 9 x 8.25 x 1.5 in — 22.9 x 21 x 3.8 cm PROVENANCE:

Mayberry Fine Art, Winnipeg, MB & Toronto, ON; Marion Scott Gallery, Vancouver, BC; Donald Ellis Gallery, New York, NY; Private collection, British Columbia EXHIBITED:

Modern Vision, Inuit Masterworks from The 1960s and 1970s, Marion Scott Gallery, Vancouver, BC, 23-28 July, 2012; Two Thousand Years of Inuit Art, Frieze Masters Art Fair, London, UK, 5-8 October, 2017 LITERATURE:

Donald Ellis, Gallery Catalogue (Toronto: Donald Ellis Gallery Ltd., 2012) 79, pl. 29 $15,000—25,000

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t100

JOHN PANGNARK ᔭᓐ ᐸᓇ (1920-1980), ARVIAT (ESKIMO POINT) MOTHER AND CHILD stone, signed indistinctly in syllabics, ca. 1960 7.25 x 6.75 x 6.5 in — 18.4 x 17.1 x 16.5 cm PROVENANCE:

Marion Scott Gallery, Vancouver, BC; Donald Ellis Gallery, New York, NY; Private collection, British Columbia EXHIBITED:

Modern Vision, Inuit Masterworks from The 1960s and 1970s, Marion Scott Gallery, Vancouver, BC, 23-28 July, 2012; Two Thousand Years of Inuit Art, Frieze Masters Art Fair, London, UK, 5-8 October, 2017 LITERATURE:

Donald Ellis, Gallery Catalogue (Toronto: Donald Ellis Gallery Ltd., 2012) 75, pl. 26 $15,000—25,000 An artist’s sensibilities were perhaps never better suited to the materials available to them than John Pangnark’s were to the hard, unyielding stone of Arviat (Eskimo Point), where he settled in the 1950s following early years living off the land. 1 The first documented sculptures by Pangnark, while abstract, have readily identifiable anatomical elements, a characteristic that would recede in later works, subsumed by an increasing degree of abstraction and unparalleled confidence in line and volume.

The present sculpture made during Pangnark’s 1960s era production is notable for its masterful interplay between early and mid-period characteristics. From within the natural character and geometry of the stone emerge the hard edges of a figure, its head and limbs appear in stilled movement, and as though cloaked or in silhouette. A defining characteristic of the artist’s work, the figure’s simple face radiates calm—a whisper of fine lines, it is rendered with the utmost subtlety. The face and expression is echoed by that of a small child swaddled on the back of the figure in a touching image of mutual affection.

1 Norman Zepp, Pure Vision, The Keewatin Spirit, (Regina: Norman Mackenzie Art Gallery University of Regina, 1986), 75.

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tAKEEAKTASHUK We are pleased to present two works by Akeeaktashuk in this auction, lots 101 and 102. Perhaps one of the best known and most iconic Inuit sculptors of the early twentieth century, the work of the artist was much lauded during his own time. 1 The attention given to Akeeaktashuk’s work made him highly influential among fellow sculptors as well as among early collectors.

No works by Akeeaktashuk can be dated past 1953 when the artist and his family were relocated to Qikiqtaaluk (Craig Harbour) and later Aujuittuq (Grise Fiord) in a misguided government project that promised to improve living conditions through the increased availability of game. 2 3 A supremely talented artist, whose extended family included Johnny Inukpuk, and the artist’s brother, the gifted Pilipusi Novalinga, Akeeaktashuk’s sculptures remain distinctly recognizable despite his influence among his contemporaries.4 Characterised by an exceptional clarity of form and purity of vision, the present lots epitomise the artist’s talents.

Passed by descent through the family of the consignor, the present lot and lot 101 (or) 102 of this auction were acquired on the personal recommendation of the noted explorer, arctic archeologist, public servant, and author Graham Westbrook Rowley, CM, MBE.5 1 Darlene Coward Wight, Early Masters: Inuit Sculpture 1949-1955. (Winnipeg: Winnipeg Art Gallery, 2006), 29.

2 Wight, 29-30 3 Samia Madwar, “Inuit High Arctic Relocations in Canada”, The Canadian Encyclopedia, 2020. Accessed April 22, 2022, Click here to read more 4 Wight, 30.

5 John MacDonald, “Graham Westbrook Rowley (1912-2003)”, Arctic Institute of America Journal: Arctic, 2004. vol. 57, no. 2, p. 223-224.

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101 AKEEAKTASHUK ᐊᑭᐊᑐᓱ (1898-1954), INUKJUAK (PORT HARRISON) HUNTER stone, ivory, soap, leather, unsigned, ca. 1950 9 x 5.75 x 3.5 in — 22.9 x 14.6 x 8.9 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, London, UK $3,000—5,000

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102 AKEEAKTASHUK ᐊᑭᐊᑐᓱ (1898-1954), INUKJUAK (PORT HARRISON) HUNTER

stone, ivory, soap, sinew, unsigned, ca. 1950

7 x 4 x 3 in — 17.8 x 10.2 x 7.6 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, London, UK $2,000—3,000 VIEW THIS LOT JUNE 4 - 9, 2022

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t KAROO ASHEVAK Striking in its asymmetry and its defiance of human proportions, this charming and somewhat mischievous-looking sculpture of a shaman by Karoo Ashevak dates circa 1970. A marvellous example of the artist’s predilection for spiritual and otherworldly beings as subject matter, it was exhibited in the 1977 retrospective of the artist’s work, held at the Winnipeg Gallery of Art. A transforming figure looks up at the viewer with an outsized and protruding eye housed in a contorted face. The features are evocative of the gnarled visages of dream-inspired masks used in both secular dance and shamanic ritual throughout the Arctic.1 Anchored by a large hand, the figure’s corresponding appendage is diminutive and mittened—the disparity in size suggesting a magical air. The presence of the mitten may allude to the often-covered hands of the shaman during dancing, or the necessity of covered hands during certain acts of divining.2 With his noted sensitivity to material, Ashevak’s composition is emphasised by the pitted, fissured, and porous whalebone, which, as elsewhere in Ashavak’s work, hints at the immaterial character of the shaman’s domain.3 1 Dorothy Jean-Ray, Eskimo Masks: Art and Ceremony. (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart Ltd., 1967), 30.

2 Jean Blodgett, Karoo Ashevak. (Winnipeg: The Winnipeg Art Gallery, 1977) 3 Blodgett

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103 KAROO ASHEVAK ᑲᕈ ᐊᓴᕙ (1940-1974), TALOYOAK (SPENCE BAY) SHAMAN whale bone, bone, ivory, baleen, signed in syllabics, ca. 1970 7.5 x 11 x 9 in — 19.1 x 27.9 x 22.9 cm PROVENANCE:

Dr. and Mrs. G.P. Jones, St. John’s, NL; Private collection, Canada EXHIBITED:

Karoo Ashevak, Winnipeg Art Gallery, Manitoba, March 30-June 5, 1977 LITERATURE:

Jean Blodgett, Karoo Ashevak: Winnipeg Art Gallery, March 30 to June 5, 1977, (Winnipeg, Winnipeg Art Gallery, 1977) pl. 29 NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $20,000—30,000

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104 KENOJUAK ASHEVAK ᑭᓄᔭᐊ ᐊᓯᕗ, C.C., R.C.A. (1927-2013), KINNGAIT (CAPE DORSET) INTO THE LIGHT etching and aquatint, 1999, 27/100, framed and glazed framed Sheet 30.75 x 38.5 in — 78.1 x 97.8 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON LITERATURE:

Leslie Boyd Ryan, Cape Dorset Prints: A Retrospective Fifty Years of Printmaking at Kinngait Studios, (Petaluma: Pomegranate Communications, 2007), 244. $3,000—5,000 Remarkable in its evocation of shadow and stormy grey sky, and for its use of almost luminous colour, this striking work by Kenojuak Ashevak finds variation on old themes reinvigorated by etching and aquatint processes new to the artist in the mid-1990s and introduced by printmaker Paul Machik.1 A work of remarkable presence with its radiant amorphous form and surround of scattered specks of light, it is no wonder that this work was chosen as the cover image of Cape Dorset Prints, the superlative retrospective of Kinngait art published in 2007.

1 Leslie Boyd Ryan, Cape Dorset Prints: A Retrospective Fifty Years of Printmaking at Kinngait Studios, (Petaluma: Pomegranate Communications, 2007), 242.

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105 SHEOJUK ETIDLOOIE ᓯᐅᔪ ᐃᑎᐃᑎᓚᐃ (1929-1999), KINNGAIT (CAPE DORSET) FIREBIRD etching and aquatint, 1999, 14/50 unframed 28.5 x 24 in — 50.2 x 40 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Massachusetts LITERATURE:

Cape Dorset Prints: A Retrospective Fifty Years of Printmaking at Kinngait Studios, (Petaluma: Pomegranate Communications, 2007), 108. $1,500—2,500 Born in Akkuatuloulavik, an outpost camp near Kinngait (Cape Dorset) on southern Baffin Island, Sheojuk Etidlooie lived most of her life on the land before settling in Kinngait in the early 1990s. In her short but remarkable career, she produced images of a distinctive but diverse array of subject matter spanning the naturalistic and the fantastic.

In Firebird Etidlooie has rendered a mysterious and marvellously luminous creature. The subject’s cloud-like form, arms swept backward, seemingly hovers above its two dangling, triangular feet. As in lot 104 of this auction, Etidlooie’s image employs to advantage the etching and aquatint processes new to artists in Kinngait in the mid-1990s.

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tPARR Born in 1893 in an isolated camp on the southern shore of Baffin Island, Parr lived through a time of significant change for many Inuit. Despite this, like many early and mid-twentieth century Inuit artists, he lived much of his life in a manner similar to those before him, informed by tradition that emphasised the proximity of physical and spiritual worlds.1 Parr had suffered a significant hunting accident in his prime, and by the time he started drawing–on the prompting of Terry Ryan in 1961–his ability to hunt and sustain himself was severely hampered.

When Parr did start drawing, images flowed out of him with remarkable rapidity and apparent ease.2 During the last eight years of his life Parr produced more than 2,000 drawings on paper, 28 of which were translated into prints, and another five produced as etchings and engravings.3 Parr is primarily known through his printed images, marvellous for their rhythmic composition and mysterious x-ray-like depictions of physical—or perhaps spiritual anatomy. It is however in drawings such as the present work with its immediacy and scattershot line that the full scope of Parr’s talents can be taken in.

1 Marrion E. Jackson and Drew Armour, Parr, His Drawings, (Halifax: The Art Gallery Mount St. Vincent University, 1988), 5.

2 Terrence Ryan, Parr 1893-1969, A Print Retrospective, (Kinngait: Kingait Press, 1979), 8.

3 Jackson, 5

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106 PARR ᐸ (1893-1969), KINNGAIT (CAPE DORSET) COMPOSITION WITH HUNTERS, WOMEN, AND DOGS graphite drawing, signed in syllabics, paper embossed with West Baffin Eskimo Co-Operative seal, unframed 20 x 25.75 in — 50.8 x 65.4 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Hamilton, ON $3,000—4,000

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LUKE ANGUHADLUQ Anguhadluq’s imagery reflects a traditional lifestyle and many years spent living off of the land. His drawings and prints abound with scenes of hunting and fishing, and animals on barren plains. As in the prints made following his sometimes dense and complex images, Anguhadluq’s drawings are alive with his intimate knowledge of his subjects.

The present work, rendered in his characteristic flattened perspective, draws our attention to the many interconnected parts of a summer scene: the harvesting of fish. A cluster of figures appear beside their dwellings, kakivaks (fishing spears) in hand. They are there to retrieve fish from a trap, but are in turn accompanied by hungry birds on the ground and in flight, drawn to the scene by the promise of a meal.

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107 LUKE ANGUHADLUQ ᓗᐅᒃ ᐊᒐᓴᓗ (1895-1982), QAMANI’TUAQ (BAKER LAKE) FISHING CAMP coloured pencil drawing, signed in syllabics, disc number inscribed, ca. 1976 20 x 26 in — 50.8 x 66 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, New York, NY $1,500—2,500

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tPUDLO PUDLAT Having produced close to 4,500 drawings (the vast majority of which are held in the West Baffin Eskimo Co-Operative), some 190 prints, and a small number of carvings, Pudlo has fashioned a distinctive and highly original body of work in his lifetime. Sometimes seen as provocative for his abandonment of “traditional” imagery and the inclusion of technology new to the Inuit in the 20th century in his artwork, Pudlo, with his inherent creativity and inquisitiveness seems to have been largely above such concerns.1 It was noted in 1990 that he was then “the elder statesman inside the Cape Dorset artistic community, a position that seems delightfully at odds with his innovative spirit and youthfully inquisitive turn of mind.”2 Interested in architecture, technology, and landscape, and receptive to influences in television and other sources, Pudlo's drawings exhibit an exciting range of references. Whatever the origin, Pudlo’s images are alive with whimsical energy and curiosity—a delight to those who greet his images with the same.

1 Marie Routledge and Marion Jackson, Pudlo: Thirty Years of Drawing, (Ottawa: National Gallery of Ottawa, 1990) 13-18.

2 Routledge and Jackson, 13.

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108 PUDLO PUDLAT ᐳᓗ ᐳᓚ (1916-1992), KINNGAIT (CAPE DORSET) SAFE HARBOUR coloured pencil and felt tip drawing, signed in syllabics, unframed 20 x 26 in — 50.8 x 66 cm PROVENANCE:

Gallery Phillip, Toronto, ON; Private collection, Hamilton, ON $1,000—1,500

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109 PUDLO PUDLAT ᐳᓗ ᐳᓚ (1916-1992), KINNGAIT (CAPE DORSET) SUPPLY PLANE; CELEBRATION coloured pencil and felt tip drawing, signed in syllabics 20 x 26 in — 50.8 x 66 cm PROVENANCE:

Gallery Phillip, Toronto, ON; Private collection, Hamilton, ON

Interested in architecture, technology, and landscape, Pudlo’s drawings are alive with whimsy and curiosity as in this image of that iconic delivery vehicle and focal point of anticipation in the North: the supply plane. The plane is shown here greeted—and apparently also piloted—by Pudlo’s amautik-clad fellows.

RELATED WORKS:

West Baffin Eskimo Co-Operative, Cat. No. L27 Marie Routledge and Marion Jackson, Pudlo: Thirty Years of Drawing, (Ottawa: National gallery Ottawa, 1990), 142, pl. 82

$1,000—1,500

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BILL NASOGALUAK tAn accomplished self-taught painter, sculptor, and instructor originally from

Tuktoyaktuk, North West Territories, artist Bill Nasogaluak’s artworks have been garnering notable curatorial attention in recent years.12 Nasogaluak has created a body of distinctive, socially conscious artworks whose images draw on Inuit Shamanism and mythology, and both Inuit and Western art historical traditions to investigate a wide range of the artist’s experience. Artworks confront issues as diverse as climate change, self-harm, depression, and the impacts of industry in the North.

Nasogaluak’s artworks often contain allusions to personal experiences, sometimes emotionally fraught, including the alcoholism and death of a cousin by suicide.3 These subjects so often accompanied by shame, self-abasement, or deflection in public discourse are confronted by Nasogaluak with an uncommon openness and sometimes startling directness.

In the important work White Demons Stealing Inuit Souls, Nasogaluak presents what is perhaps his most unflinching, and certainly his most caustic rebuke of the negative effects of Southern expansion into the North.

A stark black F-15 fighter jet drops a barrage of liquor bottles in place of bombs on a prospective target below. Protruding from the cockpit of the plane, and indistinguishable from its body except by colour sits the face of a dispassionate white pilot. The image is laden with symbolism, evoking traditional Inuit images of transformation in a menacing parody of Euro-Canadian supply planes often perceived as lifelines in Northern communities.4 For a closely related and contemporaneous work, part of the collection of Samuel & Esther Sarick at Art Gallery of Ontario, see the ongoing exhibit Bill Nasogaluak.

1 Art Gallery of Ontario, “Bill Nasogaluak” 2021-Ongoing, Click here to read more 2 Prnewswire, Bill Nasogaluak: Shapeshifter, FFA, January 2020. Click here to read more 3 Bill Nasogaluak, Interview with Feheley Fine Arts, 26 March 2020. Accessed February 21, 2022.

Click here to read more 4 Nathan Baker, “Bush Flying in Canada”, The Canadian Encyclopedia, Accessed April 10, 2022.

Click here to read more

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110 BILL NASOGALUAK ᐱᐃᓪ ᓇᓱᒐᓗᐊᒃ (b. 1953), TUKTUYAAQTUUQ (TUKTOYAKTUK) WHITE DEMONS STEALING INUIT SOULS stone, ivory, sinew, signed in Roman, dated 2013 13.25 x 16 x 11 in — 33.7 x 40.6 x 27.9 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON NOTE:

For a closely related and contemporaneous work, part of the collection of Samuel & Esther Sarick at Art Gallery of Ontario, see the ongoing exhibit "Bill Nasogaluak".

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $5,000—7,000

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111 BILL NASOGALUAK ᐱᐃᓪ ᓇᓱᒐᓗᐊᒃ (b. 1953), MERVI HAAPAKOSKI (b. 1960), TUKTUYAAQTUUQ (TUKTOYAKTUK) GOOBLUALUQ stone, glass, steel, graphite, drawing is signed in Roman, dated 2013 15.75 x 10 x 1 in — 40 x 25.4 x 2.5 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON NOTE:

Accompanied by an original preparatory drawing of the sculpture. $4,000—6,000 An accomplished self-taught painter, sculptor, and instructor originally from Tuktoyaktuk, Northwest Territories, artist Bill Nasogaluak’s artworks have been garnering notable curatorial attention in recent years. 1 2 Nasogaluak has created a body of distinctive socially conscious artworks whose images draw on Inuit Shamanism and mythology, and both Inuit and Western art historical traditions to investigate a wide range of the artist’s experience. Artworks confront issues as diverse as climate change, self-harm, depression, and the impacts of industry in the North.

In Gooblualuq, Nasogaluak investigates traditional Shamanic narratives in irreverently nontraditional media. A bird-like and exultant shaman flies upward over an apparently molten planet rendered in glass by fellow artist (and friend of Nasogaluak) Mervi Haapakoski. The image of the flying shaman pervades Inuit mythology and is a familiar theme for the artist. The composition is perched on a steel stand and accompanied by an original preparatory drawing of the work by Nasogaluak.

1 Art Gallery of Ontario, Bill Nasogaluak 2021-Ongoing. Click here to read more 2 PR Newswire, “Bill Nasogaluak: Shapeshifter” FFA, January 2020. Click here to read more

RELATED WORKS:

Waddington’s, January 30, 2021, lot 65. Click here to read more

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t 112 DAVID RUBEN PIQTOUKUN ᑎᕕᑎ ᐱᑐᑯ ᕈᐱᐃᓐ (b. 1950), PAULATUK

FOX; SHAMAN’S MASK stone, signed in Roman, dated 1997 10 x 7 x 2 in — 25.4 x 17.8 x 5.1 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON $2,500—3,500 Strange and enigmatic, here David Ruben Piqtoukun has imbued one of his signature masklike faces with decidedly canid features in an image of apparent transformation. Exquisitely carved in variegated grey stone, the mask exemplifies the control of form and surface that can be found in many of the artist’s strongest works throughout the 1980s and 1990s.

RELATED WORKS:

Darlene Wight, Out of Tradition, Abraham Anghik / David Ruben Piqtoukun, (Winnipeg: Winnipeg Art Gallery, 1989) 36, pl. 31

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113 DAVID RUBEN PIQTOUKUN ᑎᕕᑎ ᐱᑐᑯ ᕈᐱᐃᓐ (b. 1950), PAULATUK FLYING SHAMAN stone, whalebone, signed in Roman, ca. 1993 5.5 x 19 x 11 in — 14 x 48.3 x 27.9 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $3,000—4,000 The joy of hearing stories told by his mother and grandmother about shamanism and traditional beliefs influenced a young David Ruben Piqtoukun and has spawned images recurring throughout the artist’s career. In this work Piqtoukun has approached a familiar subject–that of a low-flying shaman– with particular finesse and attention to detail. These images of flight appear throughout the oeuvres of Piqtoukun and his brother Abraham Anghik, and are said to originate in the supposed otherworldly travels of their grandfather, a reputed shaman.1 As elsewhere in the artist’s work, the eyes of the shaman are made of red pipe stone (catlinite) inset into the face of a being who appears transfigured and mask-like, consistent with imagery found in ceremonial and ritual masks in the Western Arctic, with which Piqtoukun would be familiar.

1 Darlene Coward Wight, Between Two Worlds: David Ruben Piqtoukun, (Winnipeg: Winnipeg Gallery of Art, 1996), 3.

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114 JOSIAH NUILAALIK ᓄᐃᓚᓕ (1928-2005), QAMANI’TUAQ (BAKER LAKE) CARIBOU SHAMAN stone, caribou antler, signed in syllabics 9.5 x 4.75 x 2 in — 24.1 x 12.1 x 5.1 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $3,000—5,000 Born into a family of important artists, Josiah Nuilaalik, son of Jessie Oonark, created a significant and highly distinctive body of work late in his life.1 Nuilaalik’s sculptures explore images of the spirit world and of transformation. While to our eye, far from naturalistic in their anatomy, his figures often convey their weight and a sense of stilled movement with an exceptional clarity.

Although Nuilaalik is sometimes quoted as having said that he had not encountered the fantastical imag es that he portrayed, this admission has been qualified by Harold Seidelman, once a patron of Nuilaalik’s, and author of The Inuit Imagination: Arctic Myth and Sculpture. Seidelman explains that Nuilaalik was very clear when questioned about the veracity of his sources. In one instance Seidelman queried if an image of a serpent with a man’s head carved by Nuilaalik was a biblical reference, “No!” replied Nuilaalik “This is real!”2 1 Gerald McMaster, Inuit Modern: The Samuel and Esther Sarick Collection (Toronto: Art Gallery of Ontario, 2011), 37.

2 Harold Seidelman, personal correspondence with the author February 17, 2022.

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115 LATCHOLASSIE AKESUK ᓚᓴᓚᓯ ᐊᑲᓴ (1919-2000), KINNGAIT (CAPE DORSET) PREENING BIRD stone, unsigned, ca. 1980 9.5 x 11.75 x 3 in — 24.1 x 29.8 x 7.6 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, United States $1,200—1,500 Known for his distinctive and often anthropomorphic sculptures of birds, Latcholassie was the son of renowned Kinngait (Cape Dorset) artist Tudlik.

While Latcholassie’s gift for abstraction and choice of birds as subject matter may have been influenced by the creations of his gifted father, his emphasis on transformational imagery and asymmetrical composition are all his own.

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CHARLIE SIVUARAPIK An exceptional artist among many talented peers, Sivuarapik is undoubtedly one of the great sculptors to come from the Puvirnituq region. The subject of articles that appeared in The Beaver magazine in 1956 and in Canadian Geographic Journal in 1960, it has been said that the artist was one of the most recognized in the region for his period.1 Although few of Sivurapik’s 1950s era carvings seem to be signed, they all bear the recognizable characteristics of the master’s hand, defined by lifelike postures, refined finishes, and exceptional attention to the representation of the subject’s garments.

Several known examples of Sivurapik’s work incorporate components made from ivory or bone. The use of these contrasting materials was often a necessity for the sculptor, who wished to include fine detail in an unforgiving stone carving. The visual effect of the contrast is to draw the eye to implements often fundamental to Inuit survival, and give them a heightened weight and presence in the composition, an effect achieved with mastery in the present lot.

1 Winnipeg Art Gallery, Charlie Sivuarapik Canadian, 1911–1968 Man Carrying a Caribou, c. 1954, WAG100.ca, Accessed April 24, 2022.

RELATED WORKS:

Winnipeg Art Gallery, Cat. No. G-72-88. Click here to read more Waddington’s, February 2017, lot 47. Click here to read more

116 CHARLIE SIVUARAPIK ᓴᓕ ᓯᕗᐊᕙᐱ (1911-1968), PUVIRNITUQ (POVUNGNITUK) HUNTER WITH BOW stone, antler, sinew, unsigned, ca. 1955 10.5 x 4.5 x 7 in — 26.7 x 11.4 x 17.8 cm PROVENANCE:

Galerie Elca London, Montreal, QC; Private collection, Ottawa, ON NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $3,000—5,000

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117 ANNIE KINNAUJAQ KADYULIK ᐊᓂ ᑲᑎᐅᓕ (b. 1928), SALLUIT (SUGLUK) MOTHER AND CHILD stone, signed in syllabics, disc number inscribed 8 x 5 x 4.5 in — 20.3 x 12.7 x 11.4 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Ontario $700—900 The 1950s and early 1960s saw a brief but remarkable flowering of art production in Salluit.1 Artists developed a highly distinctive formal style, which despite the poor quality stone found in the region, includes many of the great early achievements in twentieth century Inuit sculpture.

Sculpture from Salluit benefited from the talents of a high percentage of female artists, and so it is perhaps not surprising that there are so many exceptional depictions of mothers with children in Salluit art. This sculpture from the early 1950s by Annie Kinnaujaq Kadyulik typifies many of the most appealing attributes of Salluit carvings: a forcefulness of hand and stoutness in the figures, a monumentality in the overall form, and a subtle abstraction in the service of a pleasing composition.

A handful of Kadyulik’s sculptures have been preserved in public collections including the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, Quebec, and the Art Gallery of London in Ontario.

Unfortunately, little information is readily available about the artist’s life outside of what can be gleaned from her works, many of which are robust and compelling portraits of maternal care.

1 Michael Neill and Ted Fraser, Sugluk Sculpture in Stone 1953-1959, (Windsor: Art Gallery of Windsor, 1970), 25-26.

RELATED WORKS:

Museum London, Cat. No. 77.A.81, Standing Mother and Infant, n.d., by Uitangi Miagiji. Click here to read more Waddington’s Auctioneers, April 18, 2019, lot 94, Mother with Child in her Amaut, n.d., by Annie Kinnaujaq Click here to read more Canadian Museum of History, Cat. No. NA 517, Standing Woman, 1957, by Annie Kinnaujaq Click here to read more VIEW THIS LOT

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118 HENRY EVALUARDJUK ᐃᕙᓗᐊᔪ (1923-2007), IQALUIT (FROBISHER BAY) INUK WOMEN stone, unsigned, ca. 1960 9.5 x 4.5 x 2.37 in — 24.1 x 11.4 x 6 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Ottawa, ON $3,000—5,000 Before Henry Evaluardjuk became known for his exceptionally refined and skillfully carved bears and other wildlife subjects, his subject matter was quite varied. The early 1960s was a period in which he produced a number of remarkable sculptures of standing figures, such as an example sold by Waddington’s in November of 2008. The present sculpture, although modest by contrast to Evaluardjuk’s most extravagantly detailed works, is a notable example of the artist’s sensitively carved human figuration of the period.

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119 SHEOKJUK OQUTAQ ᓱᐅᔪ ᐅᑯᑕ (1920-1982), KINNGAIT (CAPE DORSET) INUK HUNTER ivory, stone, sinew, unsigned, ca. 1949 5.37 x 2.37 x 3 in — 13.6 x 6 x 7.6 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Ottawa, ON NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $2,500—3,500 A sculptor of virtuoso talent, and the brother of renowned artist Osuitok Ipeelee, Sheokjuk Oqutaq started carving at a young age, long before the arrival of James Houston in Kinngait (Cape Dorset), and continued to make exquisite artworks throughout his career.1 In 1979 Sheokjuk told Marion Jackson: I carved people almost at the beginning when I wasn’t carving very long. I really liked those carvings. I have built houses and I have built boats. Making a carving is harder work than making a house or a boat—especially when the stone is hard.2 The present sculpture is a superb example of Sheokjuk’s gift for simplicity, and is closely related to an example dated to 1949, sold by Waddington’s in April of 2008.

Looking at the smiling face of this crisply carved, compact hunter with his harpoon, it is readily understandable why Sheokjuk was fond of his early carvings.

1 D.C. Wight, Early Masters: Inuit Sculpture 1949-1955. (Winnipeg: Winnipeg Art Gallery, 2006), 153.

2 Marion E. Jackson, “The Ashoonas of Cape Dorset: In Touch with Tradition,” North/Nord, Fall 1982, p.

14-18, quoted in ibid., 154

RELATED WORKS:

Waddington’s, April 2008, lot 130. Click here to read more VIEW THIS LOT

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120 BARNABUS ARNASUNGAAQ ᐸᓇᐸᓯ ᐊᓇᓴᒐ (1924-2017), QAMANI’TUAQ (BAKER LAKE) MUSK OX stone, signed in syllabics, ca. 1980s 9.5 x 18 x 6 in — 24.1 x 48.3 x 15.2 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Thornhill, ON $9,000—12,000 VIEW THIS LOT

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Barnabus Arnasungaaq carved a wide variety of subject matter over his early career beginning in the early 1960s, but by the mid 1970s market demand for his exceptional musk oxen dictated that he limit himself largely to representations of these remarkable giants of the tundra. An avid hunter and active provider for his family, he sometimes tired of carving and yet approached his subjects time and again with a seemingly endless variation and depth of insight.1 Substantial in size and presence, and witness to the artist’s eye for the essential in his subject, the present weighty and monumental musk ox is representative of the artist’s turn toward bolder and more voluminous shapes in his late career.

1 Emily E. Auger, The Way of Inuit Art, Aesthetics and History In and Beyond the Arctic, (North Carolina: McFarland & Company Inc, 2004), 66.

121 BARNABUS ARNASUNGAAQ ᐸᓇᐸᓯ ᐊᓇᓴᒐ (1924-2017), QAMANI’TUAQ (BAKER LAKE) MUSK OX SPIRIT stone, unsigned, ca. 2005 7.75 x 9.25 x 3.75 in — 19.7 x 23.5 x 9.5 cm

Here Barnabus Arnasungaaq has lent remarkable clarity and solidity form to an otherworldly vision. Spare and essential, the mood of the musk ox is indicated only by a wry facial expression, the mood of the humanoid face on its back by a downturned frowning mouth.

RELATED WORKS:

Katilvik, Waddington’s January 23, 2014. Click here to read more

PROVENANCE:

Private collection, Toronto, ON $2,500—3,500

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122 MARK TUNGILIK ᒪᑭ ᑕᒐᓕ (1913-1986), NAUJAAT (REPULSE BAY) MUSK OX stone, antler, signed in syllabics 7 x 11 x 3.25 in — 17.8 x 27.9 x 8.3 cm PROVENANCE:

Private collection, British Columbia NOTE:

This lot may be subject to import or export restrictions. $2,500—3,500

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Born in Kugaaruk, Mark Tungilik later moved to Naujaat where he carved both the exquisitely refined ivory miniatures, and the larger, often powerfully elemental figures for which he is perhaps best known. In 1945 Tungilik carved a series of Christian “spirit” figures for Father Franz Van de Verde, the Oblate missionary in Kugaaruk, one of which was presented to Pope Pius XII in 1948.1 Likely dating to the early 1960s, in this iconic muskox, we see Tungilik at his most restrained and elemental. A relatively large composition for the artist, the figure has weighty, but nonetheless compact presence. A superb early iteration of a subject often revisited by the artist, who continued carving until his death in 1986.

1 Maija Lutz, Hunters Carvers, and Collectors: The Chauncey C. Nash Collection of Inuit Art, (Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2012), 114.

123 ABRAHAM ETUNGAT ᐊᐃᐊᔭᑲ ᐃᑐᒐ, R.C.A. (1911-1999), KINNGAIT (CAPE DORSET) BIRD OF SPRING stone, unsigned 13 x 6.5 x 2.75 in — 33 x 16.5 x 7 cm PROVENANCE:

Fred and Laura Reif Collection of Inuit Art, Berkeley, CA $2,500—3,500

Carvings of great refinement in form and sensitive treatment of surface, Abraham Etungat’s birds, commonly referred to as “Birds of Spring” are marked also by their exquisite symmetry and use of sumptuous material.

Here we see one of Etungat’s iconic birds, its wings sculpted from nearly translucent modelled green stone, outswept in a gesture of impending flight.

RELATED WORKS:

Canadian Museum of History, Cat. No. IV-C-5342.

Click here to read more

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Index A

G

O

AKEEAKTASHUK (1898-1954) (101, 102) AKESUK, LATCHOLASSIE (1919-2000)(115) AKPALIAPIK, MANASIE (B. 1955) (85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90) ANGUHADLUQ, LUKE (1895-1982) (107) ARNASUNGAAQ, BARNABUS (1924-2017) (120, 121) ASHEVAK, KAROO (1940-1974) (103) ASHEVAK, KENOJUAK (1927-2013) (104)

GERVAIS, LISE (1933-1998) (18)

ODJIG, DAPHNE (1919-2016) (66, 67, 68) OONARK, JESSIE (1906-1985) (83, 84, 96, 98) OQUTAQ, SHEOKJUK (1920-1982) (119)

H HOPKINS, TOM (1944-2011) (55) HUNT, RICHARD (B.1951) (79)

I ISKOWITZ, GERSHON (1921-1988) (53,54)

J B BEAN, AUGUSTUS (1850-1926) (80) BEARDY, JACKSON (1944-1984)(75, 76) BEATTY, JOHN WILLIAM (1869-1941) (39) BEAU, HENRI (1863-1949) (12) BEAULIEU, PAUL VANIER (1910-1996) (21) BELLEFLEUR, LÉON (1910-2007) (25) BLACKWOOD, DAVID LLOYD (B.1941) (8) BLOORE, RONALD LANGLEY (1925-2009) (50) BOBAK, MOLLY LAMB (1922-2014) (42) BRANDTNER, FRITZ (1896-1969) (22) BUSH, JACK HAMILTON (1909-1977) (5)

C CARMICHAEL, FRANKLIN (1890-1945)(32) CASSON, A. J. (1898-1992) (6, 7, 35) CHAMBERS, JACK (JOHN) (1931-1978) (44) COBINESS, EDDY (1933-1996) (74) COLLIER, ALAN CASWELL (1911-1990) (40) COLLYER, NORA FRANCES ELISABETH (1898-1979) (36, 37) COSGROVE, STANLEY MOREL (1911-2002) (58) CURNOE, GREGORY RICHARD (1936-1992) (49)

D DE GRANDMAISON, NICHOLAS (1892-1978) (57)

E ENNUTSIAK (1896-1967) (93) ETIDLOOIE, SHEOJUK (1929-1999)(105) ETUNGAT, ABRAHAM (1911-1999) (123) EVALUARDJUK, HENRY (1923-2007) (118)

F FAFARD, JOE (B. 1942) (13) FAIRLEY, BARKER (1887-1986) (14) FORTIN, MARC-AURÈLE (1888-1970) (9, 10)

JACKSON, ALEXANDER YOUNG (1882-1974) (29, 33, 34) JANVIER, ALEX (B.1935) (72, 73)

K KADYULIK, ANNIE KINNAUJAQ (1928-D) (117) KARLIK, PIERRE (1931-2013) (59) KNOWLES, DOROTHY (B. 1927) (56) KURELEK, WILLIAM (1927-1977) (45)

L LETENDRE, RITA (B. 1928) (17) LISMER, ARTHUR (1885-1969) (28) LITTLE, JOHN (B. 1928) (3)

M MACDONALD, JAMES EDWARD HERVEY (B. 1921) (38) MALTAIS, MARCELLA (B. 1933) (19) MARCIL, RENÉ (1917-1993) (26) MCEWEN, JEAN ALBERT (1923-1999) (23, 24) MCROBERTS, E. A. (62) MEAD, RAY JOHN (1921-1998) (51) MEREDITH, JOHN (1933-2000) (43) MIKI, ANDY (1918-1983) (99) MOLINARI, GUIDO (1933-2004) (27) MORRISSEAU, NORVAL H. (1932-2007) (46, 47, 48, 63, 64, 65) NASOGALUAK, BILL (B. 1953) (110, 111) NORRIS, JOE (1924-1996) (4) NUILAALIK, JOSIAH (1928-2005) (114)

P PANGNARK, JOHN (1920-1980) (100) PARR (1893-1969) (106) PEEL, PAUL (1860-1892) (11) PENNIER, GEORGE (B. 1957) (78) PHILLIPS, WALTER JOSEPH (1884-1963) (1, 2) PIQTOUKUN, DAVID RUBEN (B. 1950) (112, 113) POOTOOGOOK, KANANGINAK (1935-2010) (97) PUDLAT, PUDLO (1916-1992) (108, 109)

R RAGEE, EGEVADLUQ (1920-1983) (91) RAY, CARL (1943-1978) (77) ROBERTS, WILLIAM GOODRIDGE (1904-1974) (41) ROGERS, OTTO DONALD (B. 1935) (15, 16)

S SÁNCHEZ, JOSEPH (B. 1948) (69, 70, 71) SHEPPARD, PETER CLAPHAM (1879-1965) (30, 31) SIVUARAPIK, CHARLIE (1911-1968) (116) STEVENS, RAYMOND (1953-1981) (81)

T TALIRUNILI, JOE (1893-1976) (95, 94) TANABE, TAKAO (B. 1926) (52) TIKTAK, JOHN (1916-1981) (92) TRYGG, CARL JOHAN (1887-1954) (60) TUNGILIK, MARK (1913-1986) (122)

U UNIDENTIFIED (82)

V VAILLANCOURT, ARMAND (B. 1932) (20)

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