ANNIE POOTOOGOOK
Date of Birth: 1969 - 2016 Male/Female: Female
Place of Birth: Cape Dorset
Mother: Napatchie Pootoogook
Father: Eegyvudluk Pootoogook
Grandmother: Pitseolak Ashoona
Grandfather:
Annie Pootoogook began drawing in 1997 under the encouragement of the West Baffin Eskimo Cooperative in Cape Dorset. She quickly developed a preference for drawing scenes from her own life, and has become a prolific graphic artist in the intervening years. In 2003, Annie’s first print was released: an etching and aquatint drawn by the artist on a copper plate. The image, titled “Interior and Exterior”, is a memory of the artist’s childhood, lovingly recording the particulars of settlement life in Cape Dorset in the 1970s.
Annie is the daughter of Napachie and Eegyvudluk Pootoogook, and the granddaughter of renowned artist Pitseolak Ashoona. When Pitseolak was bedridden in her final years, her granddaughter visited and watched her work; the senior artist told young Annie that some day she too would draw. Annie also notes that she has been influenced artistically by her mother’s graphics and the detailed drawings and prints of her uncle, Kananginak Pootoogook.
Generally, Annie prefers to work alone at home. She approaches each drawing systematically, beginning with outlines in graphite before working up details in black ink and finishing with increasingly bold areas of coloured pencil. Her most recent drawings have employed shading to render forms more solidly in space.
Annie’s artworks challenge conventional expectations of ‘Inuit’ art. Her subjects are not Arctic animals or scenes of nomadic existence from a time before settlement life; rather, her images reflect her experiences as a female artist living and working in contemporary Canada. Like her grandmother Pitseolak before her, Annie is an instinctive chronicler of her times. She fills her domestic interiors with details such as clocks and calendars, as well as graduation photos, inspirational quotes, and Inuktitut messages taped to the fridge in modern Inuit kitchens. Amongst meticulous depictions of modern outpost camp life and scenes peopled by local Cape Dorset personalities, Annie’s graphics are peppered with images of ATM cash machines, Playboy-style eroticism, the social services office, spousal abuse and the Iraqi war on television. The death of her mother, Napachie, has recently led Annie to create a new series of soul- searching drawings reflecting on death and personal spirituality. 2
EXHIBITIONS:
May 2002 The Unexpected Feheley Fine Arts Toronto, Ontario
2005, 2006, 2007 Cape Dorset Graphics (annual collection) (illustrated catalogue)
June - July 2005 Windows on Kinngait: The Drawings of Napachie Pootoogook and Annie Pootoogook Feheley Fine Arts Toronto, Ontario (illustrated brochure)
November 2005 Unique Visions Feheley Fine Arts Toronto, Ontario
December 2006 Ashoona: Third Wave Art Gallery of Alberta Edmonton, Alberta
January – May 2006 In the Shadow of the Sun: Sami and Inuit Art Art Gallery of Hamilton Hamilton, Ontario
June – September 2007 Documenta 12 Kassel, Germany (illustrated catalogue)
June – July 2007 Annie Pootoogook ⋅ Shuvinai Ashoona ⋅ Siassie Kenneally Feheley Fine Arts Toronto, Ontario (illustrated brochure)
Nov – Dec 2008 Breaking Ground: New Oil Stick Drawings from Cape Dorset Feheley Fine Arts Toronto, Ontario
May 2009 Narrative: Contemporary Inuit Prints From Cape Dorset Marion Scott Gallery Vancouver, British Columbia
July - August 2009 Annie Pootoogook + Shuvinai Ashoona Pierre-Francois Ouellette Art Contemporain Montreal, Quebec
September – October, 2009 Women of the North: Seen in Sculptures and Prints Arctic Artistry Chappagua, New York 3
November – December, 2009 New Views on Old Traditions The Guild Shop Toronto, Ontario
Oct 2009 – Jan 2010 Uuturautiit: Cape Dorset Celebrates 50 Years of Printmaking National Gallery of Canada Ottawa, Ontario (illustrated catalogue)
October, 2009 – January, 2010 Nunannguaq: In the Likeness of the Earth McMichael Canadian Art Collection Kleinburg, Ontario
June – July, 2010 North Meets South Feheley Fine Arts Toronto, Ontario
November, 2010 – January, 2011 Ijurnaqtut Whimsy, Wit and Humor in Inuit Art Carleton University Art Gallery Ottawa, Ontario
June 2011 Dorset Large: Large Scale drawings from the Kinngait Studios Feheley Fine Arts Toronto, Ontario (illustrated catalogue)
April, 2011 Inuit Modern: The Samuel and Esther Sarick Collection Art Gallery of Ontario Toronto, Ontario (Illustrated catalogue)
August 2011 Memory for the Future Pierre-Francois Ouellette Art Contmeporain Montreal, Quebec
Dec. 2011 – Feb. 2012 Women in Charge Inuit Contemporary Women Artists Museo Nazionale Preistorica Etnografica “Luigi Pigorini” Rome Italy (illustrated catalogue) February – March, 2012 Colour Marion Scott Gallery Vancouver BC
May - June 2012 The Unexpected Feheley Fine Arts Toronto, Ontario 4
November - December 2012 Past Sobey Award Winners - A selection from the National Gallery of Canada collection Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art Toronto, Ontario
December 2012 - May 2013 Telling Stories: Inuit Art from Cape Dorset Toronto Pearson International Airport (Terminal 1) Toronto, Ontario
May 2012 - April 2013 Oh Canada MASS MoCA North Adams, Massachusetts
April - June 2013 Dorset Seen Carleton University Art Gallery Ottawa,Ontario
May - September 2013 SAKAHAN National Gallery of Canada Ottawa, Ontario Ottawa, Ontario
September – October 2015 Fifteen Years: Kingait 2000-2015 Feheley Fine Arts Toronto, Ontario
SOLO EXHIBITIONS:
May – June 2003 Moving Forward: Works on Paper by Annie Pootoogook Feheley Fine Arts Toronto, Ontario
June 2006 Annie Pootoogook – Reflections Feheley Fine Arts Toronto, Ontario (illustrated brochure)
June 2006 Annie Pootoogook Power Plant, Toronto, Ontario (illustrated catalogue)
January 2007 - 2010 Annie Pootoogook Illingworth Kerr Gallery, Alberta College of Art and Design Calgary, Alberta
July - August 2008 Annie Pootoogook Plug In ICA (Institute of Contemporary Art) Winnipeg, Manitoba
June, 2009 – January, 2010 Annie Pootoogook National Museum of the American Indian New York, New York
August – December, 2011 Annie Pootoogook Kinngait Compositions Agnes Etherington Art Centre 5
Queen’s University Kingston, Ontario (illustrated catalogue) 6
January 2007 Annie Pootoogook Illingworth Kerr Gallery, Alberta College of Art and Design, Calgary, Alberta (illustrated catalogue)
HONOURS AND ACHIEVEMENTS:
2003 Annie traveled to Toronto to attend the opening of her first solo exhibition, “Moving Forward: Works on Paper by Annie Pootoogook” at Feheley Fine Arts, May 2003.
2003 First print by Annie Pootoogook, “Interior and Exterior” released concurrent with her first solo exhibition. Published in a special release by Dorset Fine Arts. Etching and Aquatint, edition of 50, printed by Studio PM in Montreal, commissioned by Feheley Fine Arts in Toronto, May, 2003.
2006 “35/36” and “Pitseolak’s Glasses” were released. Etching and Aquatint, editions of 50, printed by Studio PM in Montreal, commissioned by Feheley Fine Arts in Toronto.
2006 Travelled to Aberdeen, Scotland to participate as an Artist in Residence in Artists at Glenfiiddich, Scotland in the Summer of 2006.
2007 Invited to exhibit at Documenta 12 in Kassel, Germany.
2007 Selected as a feature artist for the 2007 Montreal Biennale.
2006 Winner of the 2006 Sobey Art Award in November of 2006.
SELECTED REFERENCES:
Documenta Kassel 16/06 – 23/09 2007, Exhibition Catalogue, Kassel, 2007.
Baerwaldt, Wayne, Nancy Campbell, Deborah Root. Annie Pootoogook. Calgary: Alberta College of Art and Design, 2007.
Feheley Fine Arts “Moving Forward: Works on Paper by Annie Pootoogook,” Exhibition Brochure, Toronto: Feheley Fine Arts, 2003.
Feheley Fine Arts “Annie Pootoogook: Reflections”, Exhibition Brochure, Toronto: Feheley Fine Arts, 2006.
Feheley, Patricia “The Art of Annie Pootoogook,” Inuit Art Quarterly, Summer 2004: 11.
Milroy, Sarah. “Inuit Art Loses the Ookpik.” The Globe and Mail, 5 July 2006, R1+.
Pootoogook, Annie “Watching the Iraqi War on TV” (2003), image reproduction in The Walrus, December/January 2005.
(The) Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery “Annie Pootoogook”, Exhibition Catalogue, Toronto: The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery, 2006. Ryan, Leslie Boyd 7
CAPE DORSET PRINTS: A Retrospective, Pomegranate, San Francisco, California, U.S.A., 2007.
Sinclair, James “Breaking New Ground: The Graphic Work of Shuvinai Ashoona, Janet Kigusiuq, Victoria Mamnguqsualuk and Annie Pootoogook,” Inuit Art Quarterly, Fall/Winter 2004: 59-61.
Whyte, Murray. “Northern Art Without Artifice: Artist depicts the pain and tedium of everyday life.” The Toronto Star, 25 June 2006.
Cotter, Holland. “Postcards from Canada’s ‘New North’.” The New York Times, July 24, 2009
COLLECTIONS:
Acadia University, Wolfeville, Nova Scotia Art Gallery of Hamilton, Hamilton, Ontario Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Ontario Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, Halifax, Nova Scotia Canada Council Art Bank, Ottawa, Ontario Canadian Museum of Civilization, Hull, Quebec Confederation Centre Art Gallery, Charlottetown, PEI Illingworth Kerr Gallery, Alberta College of Art and Design, Calgary, Alberta Indian and Northern Affairs Canada Indian and Inuit Art Centre, Ottawa, Ontario MacDonald Stewart Art Centre, Guelph, Ontario Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Montreal, Quebec National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario Portrait Gallery, Ottawa, Ontario Power Plant, Toronto, Ontario