Nunavut art workshop geared toward youth healing and leadership

Daisy Panika, right, and Susan Nuluk, from Repulse Bay, during a women’s workshop in Whale Cove which helped to teach participants traditional survival skills. Panika, program coordinator for the Kivalliq Inuit Association, is helping to host an upcoming art therapy workshop in Rankin Inlet. (PHOTO COURTESY DAISY PANIKA)

Paintings can look lovely on the wall and homemade parkas can keep you warm in winter.

But the process of painting and sewing together — of taking the time to make something beautiful, to build confidence and self-esteem, and to share stories and ideas — is sometimes more important.

Especially, says Daisy Panika, for youth.

“When we’re sewing and drawing, we’re talking and making new friends so that’s a way of healing and making youth want to be more involved,” said Panika, program co-ordinator for Kivalliq Inuit Association. “It’s a chance to meet new friends, try new opportunities.”

To that end, the KIA, with financial help from the Government of Nunavut’s departments of economic development and transportation as well as culture and heritage, is hosting an art therapy workshop at the trade school in Rankin Inlet from Nov. 3 to Nov. 7.

They have enough money to bring in two participants from each community. The deadline for applying is Oct. 17.

And while there’s no specified age limit, most of the applicants are youth, Panika said, and at least half have expressed an interest in the sewing component.

Epiksaut Friesen, a young artist originally from Rankin Inlet and now living in the western Arctic, will be one of the workshop facilitators, Panika said. Friesen participated in a similar workshop a few years ago and credits it for helping to launch her artistic career.

“I like that youth to youth dialogue, where you’re comfortable, because she’s another youth,” said Panika.

They are also bringing in Paul Mantrop and Rob Saley, two artists from the Ontario-based art collective Drawnonward — a clever moniker that reads the same forwards and backwards.

The goals of the workshop are multiple, Panika said.

The first is simply to teach skills and techniques in drawing, painting, sewing and making wall hangings so that participants might return to their home communities and continue using those skills to earn money.

But a side effect of gathering together is that people talk while they work and maybe they share things they might not share with their family members or close friends. That’s where the therapy part comes in, something which is badly needed for so many of Nunavut’s troubled youth.

Panika described an experience she had at a Youth Celebration Camp in Coral Harbour from July 29 to Aug. 7. Participants first held a suicide prevention walk and then they went out to camp on the land for five days.

On the first day of camp, the facilitators asked for those who had thought about or had attempted suicide in the group to stand up. Only two remained sitting.

“That was so sad. There were almost 80 of us there and only two didn’t stand up. It was so emotional. I’m starting to cry just thinking about it,” she said.

“It was sad at first but then we got to know each other and we created new friends and we’re still today networking with each other.”

Since most participants in this art workshop will be youth, she’s hoping to discuss during ways in which they can find or raise money to hold workshops and events in their own communities.

Sharing ideas at a gathering such as this and building confidence also fosters leadership, she said.

“We want them to be more involved in leadership training opportunities, self-discipline and being able to motivate yourself and have courage to take advantage of what’s offered,” she said.

“I know a lot of people who constantly complain that there’s nothing to do. Well, go do it. You want to start a sewing night program? Here’s how to get the funding.”