Lot 85: Frank Wilbert Stokes (1858-1955)

Innuit Mourners (Aurora Borealis) signed and dated 'F.W Stokes/Greenland 1894' (lower right) oil on canvas, unframed 28 1/8 x 281/4in. (71.4 x 71.8cm.) PROVENANCE The Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.; sale Christie's, 17 September 1998, lot 160 EXHIBITION London, Messrs Graves and Co's Galleries, 1895, no.1: 'When an Innuit (Eskimo) dies, it is the custom to leave to the bereaved the duty of burying the dead, which consists in laying the body on the ground and building heavy stones oner it for protection from bird and beast. The ground is frozen too hard to permit of digging a grave. After sepulture has been performed, the family of the deceased return to their stone house, or igloo, and mourn silently for the departed for five consecutive days, visiting the grave each day, when they walk once around it and then return to their igloo. The Innuits say that the Aurora Borealis makes a whistling, singing noise; it is the Great Spirit, Tong-wah-hook-suah, talking. The picture represents an Innuit (Eskimo) mother on the extreme right who, with her two sons, has just walked around the grave silently, and has stopped to commune with the Great Spirit and that of her dead husband, who is now one of the stars. Mourners are visited during the five days, and when they appear outside, the rest of the tribe retire from site. The place is at an important and very ancient Innuit settlement on the shores of Inglefield Gulf, near Academy Bay, called Karnaheghlooksuah, where a large cemetery exists.' NOTES Stokes was artist on Peary's North Greenland expedition, 1893-94. For his work in the Arctic see Stokes' interview in The Studio, London 1895, V, pp.209-14, and Christie's, London, Exploration and Travel, 17 September 1998, pp.148-151.