Kananginak Pootoogook: Prints

Our first profile of 2025 features printed editions by Kananginak Pootoogook, one of Inuit art’s legendary practitioners. Born in 1935 in a camp on southern Baffin Island, Pootoogook experienced the transition from a land-based way of life to one in which modern influences, imposed from the South, were integrated with Inuit traditions. In the late 1950s, Pootoogook played a pivotal role in the establishment of Kinngait’s now famous printshop, learning and eventually mastering the techniques of relief printing and etching. From the beginning, his own printed images—as one of the printshop’s original technicians, he also helped render other artists’ drawings into published editions—stood out due to their relative naturalism, meticulous attention to detail and dynamic use of modern perspective. In the 1960s, Pootoogook became known for his careful renderings of various forms of northern wildlife. In the 1980s, he became interested in detailing Inuit traditions and the cultural transformations he had witnessed in his youth, producing a valuable visual record of historical change.