April 17 - May 8

Qavavau Manumie (b. 1958) started to draw as a teen, when a new generation of artists were beginning to create imagery that reflected contemporary life in the Arctic. He began working at the Cape Dorset graphic studio in the 1980s, first as a master printmaker and later began contributing prints to the annual collection. His drawings are idiosyncratic and often amusing in his depiction of Inuit legends and mythology, Arctic wildlife and contemporary aspects of Inuit life.  Qavavau's images have a gentleness and quiet whimsy, combining observations of the natural world with imaginative details such as polar bear-riding Inuit or a narwhal with a sealskin coat and flexible tusk. One theme that runs through much of Qavavau's work is the “Inuralaat” - the little people who, in Qavavau's imagining, explore a mysterious contemporary world or hitch rides on the backs of a bird.