Greg,
We are currently doing something similar stripping on a bidarka.

Yup, After a long time applying energy else where I am finallly back to boat building (YEah!!!!) More on htat later.

As someone with a long appreciation of Inuit art and culture here are some background concepts that may be helpful. Inuit art is more then jsut a set of forms. To appreciate Inuit art, one msut appreciate those things that make Inuit culture unique.

Some of the most facinating Inuit material comes from their culture's spiritual beleifs in transformations. These transitions appear many many times in the Inuit mythologies. These mythologies are a very rich set of tales passed down through long hours of story telling. I'd argue its as detailed and full of subtext and wisdoms as any literature on earth. These trasitional forms leave story telling and enter into Inuit print work and carvings frequently. They tend to be some of my favorite works.

On our boat in progress we are stripping in a Narwal that transforms to an otter to seal to a walurus to a hunter in....a bidarka then back into the sea again.

The appearance of transformations i.e. an animals spirit leaving its own body to enter another form is ussually done in deep flowing curves and occasionally mandellas. If an animal is transforming into a human form you will see appendages becoming hands etc. Transformations tend to be two tone or color representations.

Other inuit forms tend to revolve around activites, boat building being a fairly common theme, so is hunting etc. Also their art work is unique in the way it depicts human relationships. Soap stone carvings of human bonds are truly wonderful. There is a connectedness and symetry between individuals that always implies community. THat sense of community always runs deep in any Inuit art forms.

Another theme that pervades Inuit art all the way back to antiquity is joy and laughter. I can think of no other culture that devotes such a percentage of its art to the depiction of laughter. Often in combination with dancing. I have found myself in museums laughing along with the Gods, a dancing mother, a Hunter giving thanks besides a seal. If you spend anytime really studying Inuit art be prepared to laugh and smile.

Finally, most art that depicts more then a scene will have as a primary theme, the sense of working in community. If a single individual is depicted it is most often describing the work he or she is doing for the good of all.

Finally, if one is to understand Inuit artistic forms, one must understand the very real sense for things that we out side of this culture have a hard time beleiving and connecting with at the level of real expereince. This is a culture that has no word for "I." A person when refering to them selves in English can ussually comfortably only go so far as saying something like. "One could go hunting today. Translated " I intend to go hunting today do you want to come with me? Simply stated individuals thing of them selves in the terms of the community to a degree that may be hard for the western mind to fathom. On the one hand this is a culture of very wonderfully diverse characters and personalities, but it is also a culture of individuals that hold little sense for the perception of individual seperateness. This is reflected in the cultures art.

THis cultures art also describes the most delicous parodox of all describing the deep stoic nature and quiet dignity found in combination with a joy a humor and laghter that is infectious and lights even 6 months of darkness.

If you can add these into your sense of the art you will have done more then copied a form, but instead made your own transformation of spirit.

Best of Luck,

!RUSS