Bill Woodrow
Double Canoe,2012
Silver and gold necklace
23 x 13,5 x 3 cm
Edition of 8 + 4 AP
Signed and numbered
TheView Edition
The Double Canoe Necklace by Bill Woodrow is deeply inspired by the artist’s fascination with indigenous cultures and their artefacts. In particular, it draws from the elegant and functional designs of First Nation North American canoes, as well as Inuit kayaks—objects that connect humans to water and the landscape in meaningful, age-old ways. Woodrow’s ongoing exploration of these themes delves into how traditional objects are perceived and transformed in modern, industrialised contexts.
The necklace’s origin story begins in 2012 at the View Studio in Genoa, where Woodrow was surrounded by the serene reflections of anchored ships and the sight of canoeists gliding across the bay’s calm waters. This setting, combined with a series of sculptures and drawings inspired by archival photographs of Inuit life, sparked the initial idea of modelling a small canoe in wax. What began as a single canoe necklace evolved into the concept of the Double Canoe Necklace, as Woodrow grappled with the complexities of representing landscape and reflection in a sculptural form.
The Double Canoe Necklace stands as a poetic resolution to the interplay between two and three-dimensional representation. While the Single Canoe Necklace exists in the tangible, real landscape of the wearer’s body, the Double Canoe Necklace embodies a constructed, perpetual scene—a moonlit, reflective image that captures the transient beauty of water and landscape. In this way, the piece becomes an evocative representation of a timeless, dreamlike moment.
