Cape Dorset (Apr 25/05) - The West Baffin Eskimo Co-op in Cape Dorset closed its doors last Monday, out of respect for James Houston, who died in Connecticut last weekend at the age of 83.

Houston organized the first exhibition of Inuit art in 1949 and introduced printmaking to Nunavut. His connection was strongest to Cape Dorset, where he lived in the 1950s and 60s.

"The smallest settlement in the Arctic has created more artists than any good-sized town or city in Canada," he told News/North in 1999.

Jimmy Manning, Co-op manager, said the community was very sad at the news of Houston's death, but at the same time were expressing "good happy feelings," remembering the man fondly.

Terry Ryan, a friend of Houston's, was manager of the Co-op in the 1960s. He described Houston as a "bombastic, enthusiastic soul," who happily adapted to life in the Arctic, visiting camps by dogsled.

Houston was born in Toronto in 1921 and attended the Ontario College of Art. From 1940 to 1945 he was a member of the Toronto Scottish Regiment, fighting in the Second World War.

Looking for inspiration for his own art brought him to the Arctic in 1948. Not speaking Inuktitut, Houston used his sketch pad to bridge the language gap.

In Inukjuak, after Houston sketched a woman, her husband, Nayoumealook, grabbed the pad and drew Houston. Nayoumealook left briefly and when he returned he raised his fist to Houston's face.

Art discovery

Houston thought he was about to be popped in the nose, but Nayoumealook opened his fist to reveal a gift of a carving.

"All of a sudden a great art form appeared right before our eyes, not one of us, certainly including me, had known existed," said Houston in 1999.

Kneeling Caribou, Nayoumealook's three inch long carving, was included in an exhibit six years ago at the Canadian Museum of Civilization celebrating the birth of Nunavut.

Houston bought the first 100 pieces of the museum's Inuit art collection and arranged the first-ever exhibition of Inuit art in November 1949 at the Canadian Handicrafts Guild in Montreal.

That show went on to tour Europe from 1955 to 1959, awakening collectors in many countries to the allure of soapstone carvings.

Maria Von Finckenstein, the Canadian Museum of Civilization's curator of Inuit art, worked with Houston on the 1999 retrospective and remembered him as a gracious man who put her at ease.

"He was a born storyteller," she said. Houston was "absolutely crucial" in developing the market for Inuit art, she said.

"Being an artist himself, he recognized their beauty," she said. "Other people had seen them and bought them before, but nobody had seen it as a potential way for the Inuit to make a living."

After observing the traditional art of engraving tusks, he thought the same kind of images would work as prints.

Houston travelled to Japan in 1958-59 to learn printmaking, then brought the techniques back to Cape Dorset.

The Cape Dorset Co-op produced its first print collection in 1960, and more print shops were established in other communities. Their annual collections are now hot commodities on the international art market.

Houston met his first wife Alma, a journalist, when she covered one of the early Inuit art exhibits.

They married in 1951 and moved to Cape Dorset, where they lived until 1962, raising two sons, John and Sam.

Though he left Cape Dorset in 1962 and moved to New York where he became a designer for Steuben Glass, Houston remained an advocate of Inuit art, giving lectures at galleries, universities and museums in the United States.

Houston became an author and filmmaker, and published his autobiography, Confessions of an Igloo Dweller, in 1995. He became an officer of the Order of Canada in 1972.

His family will scatter half of his ashes in the hills of Cape Dorset later this year.