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Okvik Head
Alaska
Head
Okvik, Old Bering Sea I culture
Archaic Eskimo
200 BC – 100 AD
Marine ivory
Height: 7.7 cm – 3 in.
Provenance
Ex collection Donald Ellis, Canada
Ex private collection, France
Published:
“Art of the Arctic : Reflections of the unseen – Ivories from the Bering Sea”, Donald Ellis, 2015, pl. 8 page 24
Sold
This head, sculpted in a partially fossilized walrus tusk is quite exceptional in terms of its spare lines, its refinement and in the extreme stylization of the features, reminiscent of the art of Giacometti or of Brancusi.
The style is characteristic of the Okvik culture (Old Bering Sea I), an archaic civilization of the Arctic which developed on St. Lawrence Island in the southern Bering Strait in Alaska during the first millennium B.C.
The style is characteristic of the Okvik culture (Old Bering Sea I), an archaic civilization of the Arctic which developed on St. Lawrence Island in the southern Bering Strait in Alaska during the first millennium B.C.
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