Honoring My Father, Milo Minock

 Artist’s Statement

My artwork is almost like that of my father, Milo Minock.  As a young person, I started out drawing in ink on white paper.  I drew common things, then, amazing my friends by copying popular comics and cartoons.  At first, I thought everyone could draw, but soon learned that this was not so. Later on, I met other artists and carvers and we would exchange ideas.  

My father was a well-known artist whose work appears in many collections.  As I went along, I started to pay more attention to my his artwork.  It started to interest me.  What intricate work and careful art he was doing!  He often used India ink to draw on rabbit skins.  . He drew people cutting fish, hunting scenes, dancing, and tool making.   His art was clear and meaningful.  In 1967, I left Alaska to attend the Institute of American Indian Arts, in Santa Fe, New Mexico.  When I returned I continued to learn from my father who told me that I should start to pay attention to native people’s faces, doing serious things, how elders talk to us, and how modernization would affect us – all the things that relate to Alaska native people.  As I went along in my life, my interests and materials expanded.  I started to experience other native cultures, non-natives, and my work began to include large public murals and, recently,   illustrations for books.

My art is of the Yup’ik communities of the Yukon and Kuskokwim Rivers, tundra villages and southwest coastal villages and other Alaska cultural communities. 

This show is dedicated to the memory of my mother and father,  who  inspired me how to live, survive, who taught us how to entertain ourselves; how to prepare ourselves for each season, and cope with life in our region of Lower Yukon River, Alaska.  My wife, Janet, and I also dedicate this show to the memory of our son, Eric.