Koutoküdluk - My First Love. Edward Adams. 1851. Watercolour. 18.5 x 13.6 cm. Scott Polar Research Institute. University of Cambridge. Y: 83/11/55. With permission

Sometime between autumn 1850 and the summer of 1851, a young Yup’ik woman from Taciq, Alaska, clearly stole the heart of a young assistant surgeon from England. Edward Adams was part of a British naval expedition and he was left to overwinter at Taciq with two other men. Amongst the many drawings and paintings he returned with, after four years in the Arctic with the ship Enterprise, Koutoküdluk’s portrait is different. Small, blemished and battered, the watercolour represents a much-handled keepsake rather than an ethnological record. Not only is the sitter’s name on the portrait, but the inscription “my first love” leaves us in no doubt as to the amateur artist’s affection for Koutoküdluk. 

Unlike the other rather pristine drawings that Edward must have carefully stored away, Koutoküdluk’s portrait needed to be viewed frequently to sustain him on his journey deep into the Northwest Passage. But this is not the only strange thing about the portrait. The oval blue background (12.4 × 9.5cm) frames the woman, unlike any other picture by Edward, but very like a framed picture that one might have kept of a beloved family member. Dressed in traditional Yup’ik winter clothing, Koutoküdluk’s expression is relaxed and a little mysterious; her mouth suggests the beginning of smile. The focus of her gaze is ambiguous, perhaps a sign that Edward struggled to depict her eyes to his satisfaction. Her hair is worn “very long and parted in the middle … below the ears it is confined by a strip of fur or a string of beads, & twisted into a knot” as Edward described women of Taciq in general in his journal (Entry for 8 November 1850). 

Given the unusual nature of the picture, we might expect to find Koutoküdluk’s name mentioned in Edward’s personal journal but she is completely absent. Since all material from naval expeditions had to be handed over to the Admiralty, it is likely that Edward rewrote his journal for official eyes back in England, potentially erasing the relationship from the record. Indeed, the journal sometimes references future events as though they have already happened. The small portrait could have easily been withheld but superiors would have expected to see the journal and a collection of drawings.  

This delicate yet striking portrait is all that remains of a relationship. Yet Koutoküdluk continued to influence Edward, as evidenced by the extensive marks, imperfections and creases that overlay her painting and show it was a much-revered portable object. These flaws only strengthen the power of this picture, showing that the making of the portrait represents only one moment in a relationship that continued to resonate as the memory of it and the picture travelled into the Northwest Passage and ultimately back to England. Edward died of typhus, shortly after the expedition, in Sierra Leone in late 1856.  

Reference: Adams, Edward. 12 October 1850 - 3 July 1851. Journal. Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge (MS 11150). 

Further reading: Eavan O’Dochartaigh. 2023. ‘Social Encounters: Portraits of the Yup’ik Women of Taciq, Alaska, 1850–1851’. Interventions, 25(8), 1005–1027. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369801X.2023.2169627

Essay by Eavan O’Dochartaigh