Artist of the day: April 2024

Monday, April 29, 2024

Artist of the Day, April 29, 2024: Kenojuak Ashevak, Canadian Inuit painter, sculptor and graphic designer (#2010)

Kenojuak Ashevak, (1927 - 2013), CC, ONu, RCA, was born in the outpost camp of Ikirasaq, on the southern coast of Baffin Island, to Silaqqi and Ushuakjuk, a hunter, fur trader and respected shaman. Ashevak first learned traditional skills from her grandmother Koweesa and began carving and drawing in her twenties alongside her husband Johnniebo Ashevak, with whom she shared her love of art. While undergoing treatment in southern Canada, Ashevak began to draw to pass the time. Upon returning north and settling in Kinngait (Cape Dorset) with her husband and family, she met James Houston and Alma Houston, who were establishing an arts program and encouraged her to pursue graphic arts through the Co-op. In the late 1960s Ashevak quickly gained recognition for her prints and has since become arguably the most renowned Inuit artist in the world.

Ashevak worked in carving and drawing but rose to prominence through her graphic works. She portrayed animals, humans and spirits of her surrounding environment, focusing on birds in particular. The Enchanted Owl, one of her earliest and most well-known works, depicts an owl that faces out toward the viewer. The texture of the body is created through dots and lines in black and white. The feathers extend out from the body and surround the bird, and the long red tail feathers reach out and curve upwards. Ashevak created a powerful and captivating image through subtle details. In 1970, The Enchanted Owl was reproduced on a Canada Post stamp; Ashevak was the first Inuk to have her artwork on a stamp. The Enchanted Owl is only the beginning of her vast and diverse output.

Ashevak participated in exhibitions across Canada, Europe and Asia, and her work is held in collections internationally. Her achievements are numerous and include the 1963 National Film Board production Eskimo Artist: Kenojuak, which opened the eyes of many to the rich cultural life of the Canadian Arctic and, in particular, Ashevak and her artistic practice. She was awarded the Order of Canada in 1967, became a Companion of the Order of Canada in 1982 and was awarded the Governor General’s Award in Visual Arts in 2008. She received an honorary degrees from the University of Toronto and Queen’s University. Further, she has been included in almost every Annual Cape Dorset Print Collection since 1960. In 2016 Ashevak was the subject of a Canadian Heritage Minute, which paid tribute to the huge impact she continues to have on Inuit artists and Canadian art.

As well as being a renowned artist, Ashevak’s extensive travel schedule placed her in the position of being a cultural ambassador and a role model for women. She was known as charming, gracious, intelligent and humorous, traits that helped her as a public figure. Ashevak spoke of her artistic practice as a way for her to financially support her family, especially after her first husband passed away in 1972. However, drawing and creating were also deeply embedded in her everyday life, and she loved it. Late in life, she was often asked when she would stop drawing, to which she responded, “This is my job and my love. I cannot imagine life without art”

© 2024. All content on this blog is protected by international copyright laws All images are copyrighted © by The CCCA Canadian Art Database or assignee. Apart from fair dealing for the purpose of private study, research, criticism or review as permitted under the Copyright Act, the use of any image from this site is prohibited unless prior written permission is obtained. All images used for illustrative purposes only

Ms. Kenojuak Ashevak

... and her work

Hare Spirits, circa 1960

Floral transformation, n.d.

The Enchanted Owl, circa 1960

Summer Owl, circa 1975

Winter Owls, circa 1975

Ravens Guard the Sun Owl, circa 1979

Timiat Juak (Large Birds), circa 1987

Decorative char, n.d.

Enchanted owl, n.d.

Throat Singers Gathering, circa 1991

Custodians of Ancestral Lore, circa 1992

Into The Light, circa 1999

Oracle, circa 1999

Quivering Seagull, circa 2004

Submerged, n.d.

Ravens Entwined, circa 2004

Two Fish and an Owl, circa 2006

Luminous Char, circa 2008

Curious Intruder, circa 2009

Grand Dame, circa 2009

Observant Owl, circa 2009

Sunburst owl, n.d.

Sunlit Ravens, circa 2009

Untitled, circa 2009

Owl with Dogs, Fish and Birds, circa 2012

Six-part Harmony IX, circa 2012

Untitled, n.d

Young Owl, n.d.

Saturday, April 27, 2024

Artist of the Day, April 27, 2024: John Greenwood, a British painter, illustrator (#2009)

John Greenwood (1959) was born in Leeds, He graduated from the Royal College of Art in 1990, where he received the Cite Internationale Paris residency award, the Burston Award and the Midland Bank purchase award.

Following a career break, recent shows have included; a solo show, ‘Being John Greenwood’ in 2014, curated by Juan Bolivar at the C+C Gallery, London and group shows in 2015, ‘Doppelganger’, No Format Gallery, London, ‘Tutti-Frutti’, Turps Gallery, London, ‘Anti-Social Realism’, Charlie Smith, London, ‘Present Tense’, Swindon Art Gallery and Museum and the ‘2nd Nanjing International Art Festival, Nanjing, China.

In 2015 John; won the Bronze Award at the 2nd Nanjing International Festival, had a residency at the C+C Gallery, London and an article ‘John Greenwood’, published in the Autumn Turps Magazine.

In 2016 John took part in ‘El Dorado’ curated by Juan Bolivar at Horatio Junior Gallery, London and Geraint Evans’, ‘The Abject Object’ at Wimbledon College of Art. He was also a finalist in the Marmite Art Prize.

In Autumn 2016 John will have a one man show at the Turps Gallery, London. He will take part in Frances Woodley’s show at the Bay Gallery, Cardiff, ‘Models and Materialities’ and Rosalind Davis’ ‘Telling Tales’ at the Collyer-Bristow Gallery, London.

Looking at John Greenwood’s paintings feels rather like staring into a cell, a place of confinement, open on one side only—the viewer’s. These are paintings of species and spaces that beggar belief. ‘I like it sometimes that I create a believable illusion of something that has never existed.

Greenwood is inspired, in part, by Cotán’s bodegóns, 17th century Spanish still life paintings with parabolic hangings of cabbages, melons, weird carrots and threaded sparrows. Cotán, for Greenwood, is king of a heap composed of many other still life painters: de Heem, Ruysch, Coorte, Kalf and Chardin to name but a few. Cotan is, he says, ‘the stubborn avocado stone that refuses to be integrated into this mush.’

Greenwood is an unapologetic raider of other people’s paintings. There is a combative streak to him: he wants to be ‘king of the compost heap’. To his mind, art of the past must be fermented and feasted upon to bring nourishment to his own. And what a mush of things and qualities lie buried there: things that hang, overflow, ooze, bulge, and glisten; lunar cheeses, velvet peaches and barnacled bread. None, however, appear directly in Greenwood’s paintings. Instead they await transformation in the heat of the ferment. Only then do glass vases in the floral still lives of de Heem and Ruysch emerge as ‘objects that have observable internal spaces, viewable through glass, crystal, or inflated transparent membranes’. Observable maybe, but also, perversely inaccessible.

Through the use of one point perspective and impeccable painting technique Greenwood imprisons his symmetrical creations in confined and claustrophobic spaces. In doing so he brings a mixture of humour and pathos to their pointless wrigglings and fumblings, squashings and balloonings. ‘Will they fall flat, dilate, deflate, or dissolve?’ Amusing speculation for the viewer perhaps, but underlying their absurdity there is also a sense of outrage rumbling away.

There is no window onto the world in these interiors. There is no light source from without or within other than that provided by the artist himself. No other world is implied or invited in; it is a world of a singular imagination. As such, Greenwood’s highly personal, obsessive and absurdist practice recalls the paintings of Hieronymus Bosch or Yves Tanguy, the animated films of Jan Švankmajer, or the sculpture of Cathy de Monchaux.

Greenwood’s process is ‘pre-verbal, or sub-verbal’ he suggests, but behind such a modest claim there would seem to lie an inconsolable imagination being put into play.

© 2024. All content on this blog is protected by international copyright laws All images are copyrighted © by John Greenwood or assignee. Apart from fair dealing for the purpose of private study, research, criticism or review as permitted under the Copyright Act, the use of any image from this site is prohibited unless prior written permission is obtained. All images used for illustrative purposes only