The group exhibition, Cape Dorset and Points South continues at Beacon’s Theo Ganz Gallery through August 17. On view at 149 Main St., the show includes a selection of Inuit etchings/aquatints and stonecuts from some of the most renowned artists from Cape Dorset and the work of six regional artists working in a variety of media including painting, ceramics, fabric and woodblock prints. The artists from Cape Dorset include the late and much honored Kenojuak Ashevak. All of the works in the exhibition were chosen to illuminate the emotional bonds we share with the animal and natural world.
Ashevak, who passed away at age 85 in 2013, was recognized worldwide for her bold and colorful images of birds and animals and the Inuit way of life. In 1967 she was awarded the Order of Canada and in 2008, the Governor General’s Award. She worked in multiple mediums.
Cape Dorset sits on Dorset Island, which is off the coast of south Baffin Island. In the late 1950s James A. Houston, a Toronto artist and writer who had studied printmaking in Japan, was assigned by the Canadian government with “fostering” the arts in order to provide the Inuit with income after their fur trade had diminished. He started a printmaking co-operative in 1959 and now, over 50 years later, Kinngait Studios and the vibrant graphics of the Inuit are internationally recognized.
