Explore The Royal Family's close relationship with the region, as well as the diverse artistic traditions represented in the Royal Collection
Wall hanging
c. 1973Wool, felt | 182.0 x 146.0 cm (whole object) | RCIN 94126
Pioneering multi-disciplinary artist Jessie Oonark combined traditional Inuit sewing techniques with bold, contemporary designs. The result was a distinctive style marked by bright, flat areas of colour and visual puns exploring the complexity of Inuit women’s lives. This embroidered wool hanging adds female faces to the handles of women’s crescent-shaped knives (ulus), which are used to prepare meat and skins. The central figure is part-woman, part-fish, and surrounded by transformation figures combining polar bears and fish.
Oonark worked with both textiles paper, becoming a pre-eminent figure in the graphic arts movement at Baker Lake in the 1960s and 1970s. In 1973 The Queen was presented with this wall hanging by the Inuit of the Northwest Territories of Canada.
