Silas Qayaqjuaq Biography
SILAS QAYAQJUAQ (Kayakjuak; Tagornak) E5-1324
Born : February 2, 1956 - 2024
Place of Birth : Hall Beach, Nunavut
Resides : Ottawa, Ontario
Silas was born in 1956 in Hall Beach, Nunavut. He is the son of two artists, Joanisi and Martha Kayakjuak. He is trained as a construction carpenter. Silas learned to carve at an early age by watching other family members carving. He began to carve at the age of eight and produced his first serious carving when he was twelve. Natural talent, a keen eye for balance and movement in the human figure, experience of hunting and living on the land combine to give Silas’s work an appealing warmth and charm. Silas moved to Ottawa in the late 1980’s and carved up until his death in 2024. Silas’ work is in collections all over the world and has been purchased for presentation to foreign dignitaries, music conductors, and art lovers alike from all walks of life. In 2006, he was a celebrated craftsperson in the Canada Day Aboriginal Village in Major’s Hill Park, Ottawa. Silas has participated as an active animator in the Inuit Activities Area at Confederation Park during Ottawa’s Winterlude Festivals.
Expositions :
1999 Northern Rock, Contemporary Inuit Sculpture
The McMichael Canadian Art Collection
Kleinberg, Ontario.
2004-2005 Miniatures INUIT
Chalons-en-Champagne et Paris, France
2006 In the Shadow of the Midnight Sun : Sami and Inuit Art
Hamilton, Ontario & Fenno-Scandinavia
2008 National Gallery of Canada,
Ottawa, Ontario
2008-2009 Music and Dance
Winnipeg Art Gallery, Winnipeg, Manitoba
2008 –2016 Mini-Masterworks VI,
Spirit Wrestler Gallery, Vancouver, B.C.
2017 Silas Qayaqjuaq - Twenty Years of Art
The Snow Goose Gallery, Ottawa, Ontario
2018 We’ll All Become Stories
Ottawa Art Gallery/La Galerie d’art d’Ottawa
Collections :
The Eskimo Museum, Churchill, Manitoba
Winnipeg Art Gallery, Winnipeg, Manitoba
Galerie Brousseau et Brousseau, Quebec City, Québec
Heard Museum, Phoenix, Arizona
Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, Québec
Ottawa Art Gallery, Ottawa
Selected References:
Brandson, Lorraine E. Carved from the Land: The Eskimo Museum Collection. Churchill, Manitoba: Diocese of
Churchill, Hudson Bay, 1994.
Fox, Matthew. “Silas Qayaqjuaq Wants to Share Ideas with Other Artists”, Interview in Inuktitut by Simeonie
Kunuk and in English by Matthew Fox en 1994; translated by Rhoda Kayakjuak, Inuit Art Quarterly: 10 (1), spring 1995 pp. 22-25
Gustavison, Susan J. Northern Rock – Contemporary Inuit Stone Sculpture from the McMichael Canadian Art
Collection, Kleinberg, Ontario, 1999.
Malaurie, Jean. L’Art du Grand Nord. Citadelles et Mazenod, Paris, France, 2001.
Hessel, Ingo. Arctic Spirit : Inuit Art from the Albrecht Collection at the Heard Museum. Heard Museum, Phoenix,
Arizona. Douglas & McIntyre, Vancouver, 2006.
Laugrand, Frédéric et Jarich Oosten. The Sea Woman. University of Alaska Press, Fairbanks, Alaska, 2008.
Basciano, Rebecca. We’ll All Become Stories. Ottawa Art Gallery, 2018