Woman and Snow Bird: Pitaloosie Saila ᐱᑕᓗᓯ ᓴᐃᓚ

A great collection is rarely the work of a single individual. It is through the many intersections with collectors, dealers, scholars and auction houses that items accumulate histories beyond their origins, telling stories of connoisseurship, discovery, and geography. Join us in a look at the first of four featured lots with exceptional provenance in our major fall 2026 auction of Inuit Art.

One of the most recognizable ensembles in 1970s Kinngait graphics, and widely considered Pitaloosie Saila’s masterwork, Woman and Snow Bird was printed in 1973, the year following the creation of her next most celebrated print, Eskimo Leader.

Both images are distinguished by an interplay of softly rounded shapes, and a distinctive division of the subject’s face into two contrasting but complimentary halves. The juxtaposing facial plains of these subjects has been likened to faces found in the images of Picasso. Pitaloosie has shared her understanding of this graphic device in a 1992 interview: “I designed it like a shadow, like one part of the face being in the dark. As if it wasn’t brightly lit in the home in those days.”[1]

Notably, unlike other works by Pitaloosie, whose print imagery is often visually divided by chiselled linework, Woman and Snow Bird is given a unified mass through rich panels of mottled red and blue.

The defining feature is nowhere more evident than in this much published printing from the edition, 37/50, which belonged to prominent and pioneering Inuit collectors including Harry and Marcia Klamer, and Dan and Martha Albrecht.

The present example’s colour is exceptionally intact—a feature faithfully documented in the 2006 publication accompanying the exhibition Arctic Spirit: Inuit Art from the Albrecht Collection at the Heard Museum, in which the present print appears on both page 227 and 235.

[1] Odette Leroux, et al., Inuit Women Artists: Voices from Cape Dorset (British Columbia: Douglas & McIntyre, 1994), 159.

Provenance:
Klamer Family Collection, Toronto, ON
Waddington’s Auctioneers, Toronto, ON, 18 Apr 2005, lot 87
Dan and Martha Albrecht Collection, Scottsdale, AZ
Walker’s Auctions, Ottawa, ON, 16 Nov 2016, lot 158
An Important Two-Generation Private Collection

Exhibited:
Arctic Spirit: Inuit Art from the Albrecht Collection at the Heard Museum, Heard Museum, Phoenix, AZ

Literature:
Ingo Hessel, Arctic Spirit (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre Ltd., 2006), 235, pl. 190.

Auction Information

Highlights of our 2026 major fall auction of Inuit Art include major works by Abraham Etungat, Osuitok Ipeelee, Henry Evaluardjuk, Pudlo Pudlat, Tudlik, Niviaxie, Kenojuak Ashevak, Barnabus Arnasungaaq, Lukta Qiatsuk, Ningiukulu Teevee, Pitaloosie Saila, Kananginak Pootoogook, and John Kavik. Also included is a small collection of ancient Arctic ivories.

Browse the gallery online.

On view at our Toronto gallery:

Saturday, November 14 from 12 pm to 4 pm
Sunday, November 15 from 12 pm to 4 pm
Monday, November 16 from 10 am to 5 pm
Tuesday, November 17 from 10 am to 7 pm
Wednesday, November 18 from 10 am to 5 pm

Or by appointment.

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