Pitseolak AshoonaLife & Work

“I came across a series of gem-like drawings by Pitseolak, so lively and colourful that they seemed to glow. I realized that even with a famous artist like Pitseolak, there was still much to learn.”

– Christine Lalonde

The critical and commercial success of contemporary Inuit art rests on the foundation built during Pitseolak Ashoona’s generation. Pitseolak Ashoona: Life & Work celebrates her “unusual life” as a bold, powerful artist who understood art’s communicative power and was conscious that her drawings presented Inuit intellectual, spiritual, and material culture to the rest of Canada and the world. The didactic quality of her art was motivated by her desire to teach others, non-Inuit and future generations of Inuit alike, about the life she experienced first-hand.

Copyright Information

Banner Image: Pitseolak Ashoona, Drawing for print Summer Camp Scene, c. 1966–76. Collection of the West Baffin Eskimo Co-operative Ltd., on loan to the McMichael Canadian Art Collection, Kleinburg, Ontario, CD.27.1736. © Dorset Fine Arts.