Tips on The Best Ways To Buy and Shop for Authentic Canadian Inuit Art (Eskimo Art) Sculptures
Lots of visitors to Canada will be exposed to Inuit art (Eskimo art) sculptures while exploring the country. These are the stunning handmade sculptures sculpted from stone by the Inuit artists living in the northern Arctic regions of Canada. While in some of the major Canadian cities (Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal, Ottawa, and Quebec City) or other tourist areas popular with international visitors such as Banff, Inuit sculptures will be seen at various retail shops and showed at some museums. Given that Inuit art has been getting a growing number of global exposure, individuals might be seeing this Canadian art type at galleries and museums located outside Canada too. As a result, it will be natural for many tourists and art collectors to decide that they want to purchase Inuit sculptures as nice souvenirs for their homes or as extremely unique presents for others. Presuming that the objective is to acquire an genuine piece of Inuit art rather than a cheap tourist imitation, the concern arises on how does one tell apart the real thing from the phonies?
It would be quite frustrating to bring home a piece just to discover later on that it isn't really authentic or even made in Canada. If one is lucky enough to be traveling in the Canadian Arctic where the Inuit live and make their fantastic art work, then it can be safely assumed that any Inuit art piece purchased from a local northern shop or directly from an Inuit carver would be authentic. One would need to be more cautious in other places in Canada, particularly in traveler areas where all sorts of other Canadian mementos such as t-shirts, hockey jerseys, postcards, key chains, maple syrup, and other Native Canadian arts are offered.
The safest places to buy Inuit sculptures to guarantee credibility are always the trusted galleries that focus on Canadian Inuit art and Eskimo art. Some of these galleries have ads in the city tour guide discovered in hotels.
Respectable Inuit art galleries are likewise listed in Inuit Art Quarterly publication which is devoted completely to Inuit art. When one strolls into these galleries, one will see that there will be just Inuit art and possibly Native art however none of the other normal traveler mementos such as postcards or t-shirts . The Inuit sculpture may be signed by the carver either in English or Inuit syllabics but not all genuine pieces are signed.
A few of these Inuit art galleries also have sites so you could go shopping and buy genuine Inuit art sculpture from house throughout the world. In addition to these street retail specialty galleries, there are now reputable online galleries that also focus on genuine Inuit art. Because of lower overheads, these online galleries are a excellent option for purchasing Inuit art since the costs are normally lower than those at street retail galleries. Naturally, like any other shopping on the internet, one must take care so when handling an online gallery, make sure that their pieces also come with the main Igloo tags to make sure authenticity.
Some tourist shops do carry authentic Inuit art in addition to the other touristy souvenirs in order to deal with all kinds of tourists. When shopping at these types of stores, it is possible to differentiate the real pieces from the reproductions. Genuine Inuit sculpture is carved from stone and therefore must have some weight or mass to it. Stone is also cold to the touch. A reproduction made of plastic or resin from a mold will be much lighter in weight and will not be cold to the touch. A reproduction will sometimes have a company name on it such as Wolf Originals or Boma and will never feature an artist's signature. An authentic Inuit sculpture is a one of a kind piece of art work and absolutely nothing else on the shop racks will look precisely like it. The piece is not authentic if there are duplicates of a certain piece with precise details. It is probably not genuine if a piece looks too best in detail with absolute straight bottoms or sides. Naturally, if a piece features a sticker label showing that is was made in an Asian country, then it is obviously a phony. There will also be a big price difference in between genuine pieces and the replicas.
This can be a genuine gray area to those unknown with authentic Inuit art. If a seller declares that such as piece is authentic, ask to see the main Igloo tag that comes with it which will have information on the artist, area where it was made and the year it was carved. The authentic pieces with the accompanying authorities Igloo tags http://journals.oregondigital.org/index.php/OURJ/user/viewPublicProfile/5504 will constantly be the highest priced and are usually kept in a different (perhaps even locked) rack within the store.
Given that Inuit art has been getting more and more international direct exposure, individuals may be seeing this Canadian great art form at museums and galleries located outside Canada too. If one is lucky enough to be taking a trip in the Canadian Arctic where the Inuit live and make their fantastic art work, then it can be safely assumed that any Inuit art piece acquired from a local northern shop or straight from an Inuit carver would be authentic. Reliable Inuit art galleries are likewise noted in Inuit Art Quarterly magazine which is devoted completely to Inuit art. The Kurt Criter Denver Inuit sculpture might be signed by the carver either in English or Inuit syllabics but not all genuine pieces are signed. Some of these Inuit art galleries likewise have websites so you could shop and purchase genuine Inuit art sculpture from home anywhere in the world.