Attr.: KIUGAK (KIAWAK) ASHOONA, O.C., R.C.A. (1933-2014) KINNGAIT (CAPE DORSET)
Spirit Figure, c. 1960s
stone, 12.5 x 7.25 x 5.75 in (31.8 x 18.4 x 14.6 cm)
unsigned.

PROVENANCE
Private Collection, Australia.

While this work is unsigned, all of the stylistic evidence, as well as the choice of subject matter points to Kiugak (Kiawak) as the creator of this fantastical beast. The artist's strong interest in spirits and transformation began in the early 1960s and Kiugak would continue to explore the seem well into his later career. Darlene Wight, in The Jerry Twomey Collection at the Winnipeg Art Gallery: Inuit sculpture from the Canadian Arctic, describes these early works as "wonderfully bizarre 'spirit' figures with transmuted bits and pieces of various animals." In the present work, we see a creature with a polar bear body that has sprouted an enormous dorsal fin and whose forepaws have began to transform into flippers or fins. Carved from a lustrous green serpentine, the face of the creature is finely detailed with bulbous eyes below a prominent furled brow, its broad snout twisted into a snarl that is simultaneously ferocious and somewhat humorous.

For examples of other spirit figures from this period, see: George Swinton, Sculpture of Eskimo, [Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1972], p. 189, pl. 482 and Cottie Burland, Eskimo Art, (London: Hamlyn Publishing, 1973), no. 31, p. 31.