May Kenalik Haqpi (1941- )
Baker Lake, Nunavut
1979
20.5 x 26.5"

This vintage piece shows the power and understated beauty of a simplified palette of colours and repetitive imagery.
While some Inuit wallhangings are a jarring clash of overwhelmingly bright and flourescent colours, this piece states its case softly and effectively.

The warm tan colour of the thick duffle background allows the 10 brown ptarmigans (four adults and six juveniles) to almost blend in (like they would in the wild with their habitat).
The alternating use of only two colours of stitches, black and white, to show the feathers on the heads and bodies of the birds, yields an overall calming effect when one views this piece.
Note that some bodies are white while others are black, and the same goes for the heads.
The lining up of the figures in columns or rows is characteristic of early Inuit wallhangings, but also fits in with how the birds walk on the ground in tandem.

Embroidery stitches: satin, seed and buttonhole.