James Houston (standing at rear), pilot, George Charity and Paulosie Kasudluak; Port Harrison, 1948. (Photo Frederica Knight)

The Inuit art world was saddened to learn of the death last month of author and artist James Houston at the age of 83.

Mr. Houston was a person of many talents. A successful writer and gifted storyteller, he produced over 30 books, including several award-winning works for children. He was also an admired visual artist whose popular designs were used by Steuben Glass, his employer for many years.

But history will likely remember him most as the man who successfully introduced Inuit art to the outside world in the late 1940s and 1950s.

Mr. Houston made his first trip to the Arctic in 1948. He was staying at Moose Factory on James Bay when he was offered a seat on an airplane heading further North, to Inukjuak (then Port Harrison) in Arctic Quebec. It was there that he saw his first Inuit stone sculptures, a gift from an Inuit friend. In Montreal later that same year, Mr. Houston showed the carvings to the personnel of the Canadian Craft Guild, who asked him to go North again in search of more carvings.

With funding from the Federal Government, Mr. Houston returned to Inukjuak and the east coast of Hudson Bay, making an additional journey to Povungnituk further North. He returned to the South with more sculptures, convinced unlike others before him that they would be marketable as original art.

An initial exhibition and sale at the Guild in 1949 proved him right, and Mr. Houston once more ventured North, this time accompanied by his new wife, Alma. The couple visited several northern communities, often journeying by dogteam through hazardous conditions. Wherever they went they assessed the artistic ability of the people, encouraging those with talent to consider art making as a potential source of income. Whenever they returned South, Mr. Houston would promote Inuit art as an exciting new Canadian artform.

In 1951 the Houstons arrived in Cape Dorset, where they discovered a wealth of artistic talent and made many new friends. The community became their home for several years, with Mr. Houston eventually becoming a direct employee of the Canadian Government and the North's first Crafts Officer. In the late 1950s, Mr. Houston was instrumental in setting up the first northern printmaking operation at Cape Dorset, the success of which inspired the establishment of similar printmaking studios in communities across the Arctic.

Mr. Houston eventually left the Canadian North, and by 1960 he had become a designer for Steuben Glass in Manhattan. During this time he also began writing works of fiction, many with northern themes. His most successful book, The White Dawn, was turned into a popular Hollywood movie. The Houstons divorced in 1967 and he married editor Alice Watson, but he and Alma remained friends and colleagues.

While historians will continue to debate the exact nature of Mr. Houston's role in helping to establish an Inuit art industry, none will doubt his importance.

"By all reports, James Houston's early efforts in the North were energetic and enthusiastic," says the Winnipeg Art Gallery's Darlene Wight. "This seems to have been the case as well with his promotional efforts in the South. He was a striking figure with great personal charm, and his ability to tell stories about his Arctic adventures was used to engage the attention of journalists."

James Archibold Houston was born in Toronto on June 12, 1921. He died in hospital in New London, Conn., of heart disease. He is survived by his second wife, Alice, and two sons from his first marriage to the late Alma Houston.