Baffin history, told in stark black and white prints

Maurice Forsyth-Grant’s prints, on display at the Nunavut legislature until Oct. 9, illustrate the sometimes harrowing experiences of whalers and traders in the early years of the 20th century. (PHOTO BY THOMAS ROHNER)

These black and white linoleum prints by Maurice Forsyth-Grant are on display at the Nunavut legislature until Oct. 9. (PHOTO BY THOMAS ROHNER)

If you’re an art lover or history buff, but don’t love reading books, you might want to visit an exhibit, now on display at the Legislative Assembly in Iqaluit, before it wraps up Oct. 9.

The exhibit, 10 stark, black and white linoleum prints by Maurice Forsyth-Grant, the great-grand-nephew of Osbert Clare Forsyth-Grant, Scottish whaler and trader, illustrates a slice of Baffin Island history from more than 100 years ago.

The prints are on loan from well-known Arctic historian Kenn Harper who told Nunatsiaq News Sept. 29 that he came across the prints while on a research trip to Scotland in the late 1990s.

Inspired by the adventures of his great-uncle, Maurice Forsyth-Grant created the prints in the 1980s. That was after he heard about his great-uncle’s exploits in the Baffin region between 1905 and 1911.

“There are elders who listened to their parents and grandparents tell the story,” shown in the pictures, Harper said, adding that Inuit gave the name Mitsiga to the whaler and trader.

Harper said he was on the grounds of the family’s castle in Scotland when he saw the prints.

“I was dumbfounded by the quality of the prints and the story they told,” Harper said.

“I thought they were so stark and severe even.”

The prints show harrowing scenes at sea in the Baffin region — such as a captain washed overboard, only to be washed back on board — by using bold and fluid lines which create a strong sense of movement.

Another print shows a survivor of one of two whaling ships owned by Forsyth-Grant, the elder, traveling by dogsled from Frobisher Bay to Hudson Strait while a brilliant sun hovers over a black horizon.

Harper explained that the Scottish whaler and trader was active in the Baffin area when the whaling industry was in decline, but before the Hudson Bay Co. began controlling most trading activity in the region.

Forsyth-Grant was still interested in bowhead whales, Harper said, but he also hunted and traded with Inuit for walrus, seal and narwhals.

Inuit worked for almost all whalers who ventured into the area, Harper said.

“When the ships would come in, Inuit would come on board and they would socialize with the whalers, have square dances, things like that,” he said.

But Forsyth-Grant was an oddity as a whaler, the historian said, because Forsyth-Grant was wealthy and, when not on an expedition, he lived in a Scottish castle.

Most other whalers led tough lives and did not come from wealthy families, Harper said.

“Forsyth-Grant was an outsider and he knew it, and he sort of resented it.”

The Scot didn’t have much luck with his whaling vessels, Harper added, because both his ships — the Snowdrop and the Seduisante — foundered off the Baffin coast in 1908 and 1911 respectively.

The 1911 shipwreck claimed Forsyth-Grant’s life — a common occurrence at this time, Harper said.

“A lot of lives were lost. It’s a miracle that more lives weren’t lost,” he said.

The Cumberland Sound area especially is “like a graveyard for whaling ships. Inuit know where they are and can show you. Some wrecks are just below the water line.”

Janet Armstrong, who curates art displays at the legislature, said the exhibit is well worth attending before it ends Oct. 9.

“This exhibit is important because the prints are just so beautiful, and the story they tell is part of Baffin history.”