Lucy Tasseor Tutsweetok

Lucy Tasseor Tutsweetok (1934 in Nunalla, Manitoba – 2012 in Arviat, Nunavut) was an Inuit artist. Known for her sculptures, Tasseor Tutsweetok worked principally with grey steatite, a hard stone local to Arviat on the Nunavut mainland, where the artist moved following the closing of the North Rankin Nickel Mine in 1962.[1] Always remaining close to the stone's original form and leaving its surface unpolished, her sculptures take maternal and family groupings as their principle themes. Notable exhibitions include: Sculpture/Inuit: Masterworks of the Canadian Arctic (1971–73), In the Shadow of the Sun: Contemporary Indian and Inuit Art in Canada (1989–91), and Indigena: Contemporary Native Perspectives in Canadian Art (1992),[1] and a solo exhibition, her first, at the Art Gallery of Ontario (2011).[2] In 1992, she completed a large sculpture for the Canadian Museum of Civilization.[2] Tasseor Tutsweetok's minimalist and semi-abstract approach to carving is accompanied by calculated drawings upon the stone's surface, she shares this approach with her contemporaries Andy Miki, John Panaruk, and Elizabeth Nutaluk.[3]