Lot 3
Figure, Old Bering Sea I, Okvik, Gambell, Sivuqaq (St. Lawrence Island), ca. 250 BCE – 100 CE
Lot 3 Details
Figure, Old Bering Sea I, Okvik, Gambell, Sivuqaq (St. Lawrence Island), ca. 250 BCE – 100 CE
comprised of ivory, an armless torso surmounted by an elongated head with releif carved high brow ridge, slender nose, and incised details
3.9 x 1.4 x 0.8 in — 10 x 3.5 x 2 cm
Estimate $2,000-$3,000
Additional Images
Provenance:
Bill Johnstone collection, Carlisle, UK
Exhibited:
The Isaacs/Innuit Gallery, Early Art and Artifacts of the Inuit, Toronto, 1999, p. 5, pl. 7.
Note:
Okvik is the earliest known phase of so-called Paleo-Eskimo culture, dating ca. 250 BCE – 100 CE, distinguished mainly by a monumental style of human or humanoid representation carved on a small scale.
The possible religious or ritual significance of Old Bering Sea sculpture is unknown, however characteristics present in Okvik figuration, including distorted facial features, implied skeletal marks, and the presence of tattoo patterns are prominent in figuration associated with the supernatural in the earliest known Western Arctic artistic traditions.
The present sculpture represents one of the earliests figural traditions known in the Arctic, an important sculpture with characteristics in keeping with subtype A of the Okvik style, as defined by Henry Collins et. al. 135, it is characterized by forcefully cut, thick, deep lines, and with an overall minimally defined, even “crude” expression.
[1] Typical of Okvik sculpture, the figure’s torso is truncated and limbless, its face defined by a dispassionate, perhaps otherworldly expression.
(1) Wardell, Allen, Ancient Eskimo Ivories of the Bering Strait, (Maine: The American Federation of Arts, 1986), 36.
Related Works:
Wardell, Allen, Ancient Eskimo Ivories of the Bering Strait, (New York: Hudson Hills Press Inc., 1986), 41, pl. 12-13.
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