Kenojuak Ashevak

Kenojuak Ashevak in 1997

Kenojuak Ashevak, CC (born October 3, 1927) is regarded as one of the most notable Canadian pioneers of modern Inuit art.

Life

Kenojuak Ashevak was born in an igloo in an Inuit camp, Ikirasaq, at the southern coast of Baffin Island. At three years old, she lost her father. In 1952, she had to be treated for three years for tuberculosis in a hospital in Quebec. During this time and later on many of her children and grandchildren succumbed to disease, as did her husband of 42 years.

Window of John Bell Chapel (Appleby College, Oakville near Toronto; designed in 2004)

Career

Kenojuak Ashevak became one of the first Inuit women in Cape Dorset to begin drawing in the late 1950s. She has since created many carvings from soapstone and thousands of drawings, etchings, stone-cuts, and prints — all sought after by museums and collectors. She designed several drawings for Canadian stamps and coins. In 2004, she started to design the first Inuit-designed stain glass window for a chapel.

Honours

Kenojuak Ashevak's star on Canada's Walk of Fame.

• In 1967, she was made an Officer of the Order of Canada and was promoted to Companion in 1982.
• In 1970, Canada Post placed her 1960 print Enchanted Owl on a stamp to commemorate the centennial of the Northwest Territories.
• In 1974, she was elected a member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts.
• In 1980, Canada Post uses her 1961 print Return of the Sun on a seventeen cent as part of its Inuit stamp series.
• In 1991, she received an honorary doctorate from Queen's University.
• In 1992, she was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Toronto.
• In 1993, Canada Post featured the 1969 drawing The Owl for its Masterpieces of Canadian Art series.
• In 1999, a famous piece of hers, the "Red Owl" was featured on the April issue of the 1999 Millennium quarter series. Her initials in Inuktitut - ᑭᓇᐊᓯᐃ - appear on the left of the design. This is the first time the language appears on circulation coinage.
• In 2001, she was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame.
• In 2004, she designed the first ever Inuit-designed stain glass window for the John Bell Chapel at Appleby College in Oakville, Ontario.
• In 2008 she received the renowned $25,000 Governor General's Award in Visual and Media Arts from the Canada Council of the Arts.

Films

• In 1963, she was featured in the National Film Board of Canada documentary Eskimo Artist: Kenojuak, directed by John Feeney, which was nominated for an Academy Award for Documentary Short Subject in 1964.

(Note on title: Feeney had suggested using the term "Inuit" in place of "Eskimo," but in 1963 it was rejected as an unfamiliar term to non-Inuit audiences)

• 1992, archival and contemporary footage of Kenojuak is featured in Momentum, Canada’s film for Expo '92.

See also

• List of inductees of Canada's Walk of Fame
• Notable Aboriginal people of Canada

External links

• Kenojuak Ashevak's Artist Profile at the Centre for Contemporary Canadian Art
• Image timeline view at the Centre for Contemporary Canadian Art
• Some of Kenojuak's prints appear at a Canadian government website.