Shuvinai Ashoona - Drawings

$900.00 CDN

$750.00 CDN

$900.00 CDN

$900.00 CDN

$900.00 CDN

$900.00 CDN

Biography

Date of Birth:  August 5, 1961            (E7-1954) – Cape Dorset

Shuvinai is the daughter of the well-known Cape Dorset sculptor, Kiuga (Kiawak) Ashoona.  She has been making art since 1988 and was inspired by her sister, Goota Ashoona and her family in general. 

Her favourite subjects are landscapes and camp scenes.  As a child, and in her adolescent years, Shuvinai lived at an outpost camp. Her family’s many photographs from this period construct a picture of fond memories of camp life.  There is a direct correlation between Shuvinai’s art and these photographs of fishing for char, hunting caribou, or visits to one or another northern community. 

Shuvinai’s drawings are different from other Inuit art.  Her emphasis on the depiction of the land (grassy landscapes, rocks, and waterfalls) is contrary to the more common stylized or non-existent landscape in other artist’s work.  She references and furthers Pudloo Pudlat’s inclusion of the contemporary view (planes and motor boats) with her depictions of contemporary northern buildings, camps, drying meat, and supply boats.  It is clear that Shuvinai knows the landscape and she draws directly from her experience and memory of the land.  She also works d’eau plein air.  Her use of perspective plays with us and there is an increasing inclusion of fantastical elements which visualize her imaginary world.  These elements, combined with multiple viewpoints, complicate our viewing.  She invites us to see her world from below, above, and sideways. Shuvinai tends to work for extended periods of time, completely absorbed in these fine lined drawings with thousands of strokes.  She usually uses pen and ink, colored pencils and graphite.

Shuvinai’s work has attracted the attention of both curators and private collectors.  She was featured along with her aunt, Napachie Pootoogook, and her grandmother, the late Pitseolak Ashoona, in the McMichael Canadian Collection’s 1999 exhibition entitled, Three Women, Three Generations. Several notable private galleries have also exhibited Shuvinai’s work.

COLLECTIONS:
Inuit Art Centre, Indian and  Northern Affairs, Ottawa, Ontario
Winnipeg Art Gallery, Winnipeg, Manitoba
The National Gallery, Ottawa, Ontario
Private collections: Canada, USA, Australia

REFERENCES:
Rosenberg, Ann, Review: Shuvinai Ashoona, Galleries West, Fall/Winter 2007, 33.
Ryan, Leslie Boyd, Cape Dorset Prints: A Retrospective, San Francisco: Pomegranate, 2007.
Telephone interview with Shuvinai Ashoona conducted with Robert Kussy (son-in-law of Kiawak Ashoona), Inuit Art Centre, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, November , 2000.

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This page was last edited  January 19, 2010
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