One of Canada's most evocative modern painters, Cree artist Dale Auger was a gifted interpreter of First Nations culture, using the cross-cultural medium of art to portray scenes from the everyday to the sacred and dissemble stereotypes about Indigenous peoples. Medicine Paint is a collection of Auger's best work, reproduced in glorious full colour and reflecting the evolution of the artist's distinctive style. Including a revealing look back at his life and professional development, the book is a stunning tribute to the master Aboriginal artist.

Auger uses bold, bright colours in his oil paintings to explore the intricate links between spirituality and the natural laws of the land. Birds, beasts and human forms are carried from the dreamworld onto canvas, their spirits channeled through his paintbrush and presented in brilliant yellows, mystic blues, vibrant reds and swirls of black. Infusing his subjects with energy, life and colour, Dale Auger masterfully presents scenes that are powerful, spiritual and inspiring. A bald eagle is majestic in flight against a bright blue sky. An elder makes a solemn offering to the Sky Being. Horses dance playfully in the frame for a sweat lodge. A warrior draws his bow and points it skyward.

Dale Auger, PhD, (1958–2008) was a Sakaw Cree artist and storyteller from the Bigstone Cree Nation in northern Alberta. He was born in High Prairie, Alberta, near that province’s second-largest body of water, Lesser Slave Lake. As a young boy he went to school in Faust, near the Driftpile Reserve, where his knack for painting brought him recognition as the “school artist.” He attended the Alberta College of Art in 1988, and studied at the University of Calgary for 10 years, obtaining a master’s degree in education in 1996 and a PhD in education in 1999. His book Mwâkwa Talks to the Loon was named Aboriginal Children’s Book of the Year at the 2006 Anskohk Aboriginal Literature Festival and Book Awards and also received the 2007 R. Ross Annett Award for Children’s Literature. He lived in Bragg Creek, Alberta, until his untimely death in September 2008. He was posthumously honoured as the 2009 inductee into the Western Art Show’s Hall of Fame at the Calgary Stampede.

Dale Auger's profile page