Sold for: $45,000

PROVENANCE
Acquired directly from the Artist by Mrs. Francis Labine Franck
By descent to a Private Collection, Toronto and Vancouver
Sold sale of Fine Canadian Art, Heffel Fine Art Auction House, November 28, 2003, lot 80
Private Collection, Vancouver
Heffel Gallery Limited, Vancouver and Toronto

LITERATURE
Naomi Jackson Groves, A.Y.’s Canada, 1968, page 208

Lockhart River is located in the Northwest Territories, southwest of Artillery Lake, northeast of Great Slave Lake. This encampment was likely a seasonal one for hunting migrating caribou, as suggested by the antlers on the ground and the rack for drying meat or fish. The caribou were the lifeblood of the northern First Nations; these ungulates migrated into the Barren Lands for the summer and then retreated down into the forests south of the treeline for the winter. A.Y. Jackson made trips to the Great Slave area in 1928, 1949 and 1957. This canvas is an outstanding example of his portrayals of this vast and untamed land and, in this case, how people survived in it using their hunting and fishing skills. Jackson’s niece Naomi Groves wrote about the importance of the North to Canada as a whole, stating, “The mystique of the North somehow survives as a basic underlay, a sort of personality permafrost.” Once he saw it, the North magnetically drew Jackson, who stated, “I guess I’m like a compass, always heading north. I really do belong to the caribou country, not to the cow country.”

All prices are in Canadian Dollars