Canadian Aboriginal Paintings depicting the rich indigenous culture of the First Nation People's Woodland style of art. Living north of Lake Superior and south and west of the Hudson Bay coast.

Artists featured are:

Eugene Morriseau, Moses (Amik) Beaver, Francis Esquega,

Dwayne Wabegijig, Allindsey Kakegamik, John Paul Lavand

Dwayne Wabegijig

Dwayne Wabegijig is an aboriginal Woodland Artist from Thunder Bay Ontario where he currently resides and works from. He has lived in Lethbridge Alberts, Sault Ste. Marie and Sioux Lookout but has spent the better part of his life in Thunder Bay.

His passion for art started at an early age where he completed drawings in pencil, charcoal and pastel for friends and family. It wasn’t until his early 20’s that he started working with acrylics and oils after discovering Salvador Dali, Van Gogh and Picasso.

At 23, his dad asked him to bring his paintings to the Native Arts and Crafts show where he was immersed in the aboriginal Woodland art of his contemporaries. It was after that show, in 2007, that he began to change his style towards the brighter colours, imagery and history of the Woodland school.

His paintings today blend the realism of nature (ie. landscapes, night skies) with the x-ray lines and bright colours of today’s Woodland art. He hopes to continue to home his craft by further integrating the legends and stories of his Ojibwe ancestry with his experiments in the Woodland school of art.

 

Eugene Morriseau
Sandy Lake First Nation

 Currently live in Thunder Bay, Ontario.  a member of Sandy Lake First Nation which is my home community.

I am one of seven of Norval Morrisseau’s children.

I am inspired by other peoples’ artwork. My other inspirations come from listening to my elders passing down stories. I try to visualize these stories and bring those images into my paintings. Each of my paintings has its own story.

Some of the people who inspired me were my uncles, Joshim Kakegamic and Goyce Kakegamic. They were the brothers-in-law of my father, Norval Morrisseau. These three people planted the seed in me to paint by letting me help them with their work when I was young.

I knew I had the talent. One of my biggest inspirations was watching my father paint when I was a boy. He used to tell me stories about the paintings and their meanings. I was too young to understand them at the time.
Back in the year of 2000, the seven of us were with my father in Thunder Bay. One evening he asked us, “Come and sit with me here”. He asked, “When I pass on, will my colours die?” After a silence, I responded, “Do you know how many generations you inspired through your artwork?”

There are four of us that inherited our father’s talent, me, Christian, David and my sister Lisa. I am a self-taught artist.
My inspiration is my father, Norval Morrisseau. Through my artwork, I would like to carry on my father’s colours in my own unique way.  When I am painting, sitting there, using the paints and colours, this is when my ideas and images come to me.

I am so grateful and fortunate to have inherited my father’s talent and to be able to carry on the Morrisseau name for my kids and future generations to come. “Your colours will live on!”
“Your colours will not die. Your colours will live on for the future generations to come. We will carry your colours.”

More information about Eugene Morriseau can be found on Lake Superior Art Gallery

Moses (Amik) Beaver

February 21, 1960 ~ February 13, 2017

Moses (Amik) Beaver was a Canadian Aboriginal Artist, from the fly-in reserve of Summer Beaver, Ontario (Nibinamik). He was self-taught, his use of colour revealing. He worked with acrylic on canvas, Indian ink on paper and watercolour. While Moses’ work reflects the black lines of traditional Woodlands art, he embraced his own unique style of embedded images of spirits, human faces and animal forms, transcending physical boundaries to the outer dimensions of the spiritual realm. In this his work reflects symbolism, realism and abstract imagery.

As stories for the First Nations People have always been a major tool of cultural transmission holding the history, values, beliefs and spirituality of the people, Moses hoped his work would resonate and awaken an awareness that is at once exciting and empowering, a way for all people to understand an Aboriginal world view.  Within this context, story telling through colour and imagery, he contributed to cultural revitalization, an awakening that continues to gather strength among the people to express and share the experience of being in and with the world, not masters of it.  

Moses worked with the youth both within the educational system and in community projects.  This relationships with youths both inspired and motivated him and was a constant source of personal growth.

Francis Esquega
Rocky Bay First Nation

Francis Esquega was born in 1955, in Macdiarmid, located on the Eastern shores of Lake Nipigon and is a member of the Rocky Bay First Nation, Biinjitaawabik Zaageen Anishinabek. His Ojibwe name is Sikaasika.
In 1986, Francis attended Confederation College, graduating in 1988 with a General
Arts and Science Diploma. Later, he went on to Lakehead University with the
intention of obtaining a BA. For personal reasons, he left in his third year before he completed it. While at university he
  took acrylic painting classes and History of Western Art. 

You can learn more about Francis Esquega at Lake Superior Art Gallery

Allindsey Kakegamic

I’ve enjoyed drawing for much of my life, but first became more serious about improving and expanding my talents around the time I was in high school, and began painting. My earliest sources of inspiration were other Allindsey Kakegamicnative artists and my great- uncle, Robert Kakegamic. I enjoyed watching the process as they brought their art to life, and it made me think about trying to do the same. 

At first I didn’t feel I was very good, but I kept practicing by drawing fan art and continuing to study other artists work. Some of my other artistic inspirations are Japanese artists such as Naoko Takeuchi and Yoshitaka Amano.

Lately I have increasingly begun to draw inspiration from music, ballads, and stories from other cultures besides my own. I find many things in these stories to be universally appealing and want to express and share them with others through my art. 

This is another aspect of my art which in some ways ties back to my native heritage. Native woodland art is an art form which preserves the old stories and legends of my culture. And I believe that it is important that my art should have a story in it or behind it.

John Paul Lavand
Rat Portage First Nation

John Paul Lavand's heritage is Ojibway. Born in 1962, he was raised on Rat Portage Reserve near Kenora, in Northwestern Ontario. He was inspired to begin drawing at the age of six years by the death of his brother. In the beginning, his main theme was portraits of people. Later, as his work evolved, he began to concentrate more on drawing wild life. John's working medium is pen and ink with a hand brush touch of colour.
In addition to maturing in his style of detailed Wild Life Art, he is now creating a limited number of traditional native works in acrylics.
In 1980, John presented his first one-man exhibit at the Wah-Sa Gallery. Through such 
exhibitions, John has obtained the recognition of being an exciting new Canadian Native Artist living and working in Kenora, Ontario.
John has been recognized globally and has successfully sold prints as far as Germany, Austria, France, Australia and Japan. 

You can learn more about John Paul Lavand at