🔎 UNIDENTIFIED Could This Be An Eskimo Carving & What Stone Is it?

[Aquitaine]

The photos don't do the carving justice as it's white not as it appears in the pictures. It's quite solid and heavy, approx. 2 lbs., and there are only numbers on the bottom of it. Is it possible to find who the person might be that made it by the numbers? I'm also wondering what type of stone/mineral it might be if it is an eskimo carving? Thanks so much!

 

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[Tpmetal]

Possibly made from a soapstone of some sort

 

[Red-Coat]

It does look to be soapstone.

The appears to be an artist monogram. If it’s using Inuit/Inuktitut syllabics it looks like it might be ᔭᐱ (Ja-Pi) but I couldn’t find it in any of the artist databases.

 

[Aquitaine]

It does look to be soapstone.

The appears to be an artist monogram. If it’s using Inuit/Inuktitut syllabics it looks like it might be ᔭᐱ (Ja-Pi) but I couldn’t find it in any of the artist databases.

Thanks, good to know it's the artists monogram although how do we find him/her for more info? It's difficult to see that's for sure. Is soapstone white like that?

 

[Aquitaine]

Possibly made from a soapstone of some sort

I didn't know soapstone was white too, thank you.

 

[Red-Coat]

Thanks, good to know it's the artists monogram although how do we find him/her for more info? It's difficult to see that's for sure. Is soapstone white like that?

Soapstone (steatite) can be black, colourless, white, grey, green, yellow or pink and various shades of off-white derived from those colours depending on the mineral impurities it contains.

There are a number of websites with databases listing Inuit artist signatures and monograms. I checked the ones I know of but couldn't find a match. Generally, these sites only list the better known artists, but there are many lesser-known ones producing souvenir-ware that won't be listed.