Sheojuk Etidlooie, Cape Dorset
Sheojuk Etidlooie was an artist from Akkuatuloulavik, NU an outpost camp on southern Baffin Island near Kinngait (Cape Dorset), NU who began producing art late in life and had a short but remarkable career. She lived most of her life on the land before settling in Kinngait in the early 1990s.
Etidlooie began drawing after having settled in Kinngait. In 1994 her first drawing appeared in the Cape Dorset Annual Print Collection, titled Upinnguaq. Etidlooie’s works were published with every Cape Dorset Annual Print Collection afterwards until the end of her career in 1999, the majority of which were reproduced as lithographs or engravings. From 1994 to 1999 she contributed 44 prints to the collection.
Etidlooie’s style was both minimal and abstract. Her most frequent subjects were animals, including dogs, caribou, fish and often birds. Etidlooie visualized figures as loosely naturalistic to outright fantastical depicting creatures originating from Inuit oral traditions and her own imagination. Several motifs are identifiable in her work: oval shapes to represent eyes, nostrils, scales and feathers; birds and caribou balancing on spindly legs with dangling, triangular feet; figures with additional limbs attached in unexpected places; and multiple renditions of splayed hides. Etidlooie is also noted for having favored aerial and cross-sectional perspectives in her compositions. She was also inclined to illustrate the material representations of human presence such as fishing weirs, sleds, boats and houses.
Etidlooie was born in 1932 at an outpost camp on southern Baffin Island near Cape Dorset, then little more than a trading post. She lived most of her life on the land before settling in Kinngait in the early 1990s. She began drawing after having settled in Kinngait and in 1994 her first print design appeared with the Cape Dorset 1994 Print Collection, titled Upinnguaq. Her works were published with the following five Cape Dorset Annual Print Collection afterwards until the end of her career in 1999 when she died. A total of 54 prints were released with Cape Dorset Anual and spring print collections. Today, her works are highly sought after and rare.
