Inuit artists put their strengths on display

GREG YOUNGER-LEWIS and ITEE AKAVAK

Four Inuit artists have found a winning combination to bring their handiwork to the world.

The artists, a group of senior graduates from the fine arts program at Arctic College, unveiled a vibrant collection of prints on May 1 for sale at the Nunatta Sunakkutaangit Museum in Iqaluit.

Together, they tap into a trove of traditional stories, new-found business ambitions, and a motivational slogan tough enough to compete with the go-get-’em attitude of hockey star Jordin Tootoo.

“We may not be young,” said Okpik Pitseolak, a 57-year-old artist from Cape Dorset. “But we want to show young people – if we can do it, you can do it.”

This is the first time that Pitseolak and her fellow graduates, who include Therese Ukaliannuk, Pootoogook Qiatsuk, and Serapio Ittusardjuat, have displayed their work together in one spot.

But if all goes as planned, the show will be one of many to come.

Eventually, the group plans to open their own business to promote and perhaps provide workshop space for their art. Even though they’re still drafting the business plan, they already have a name – Nukigiit, meaning “our collective strength.”

Besides inspiring youth, the group of four hopes that forming a business alliance with the help of their former college instructor Beth Biggs will help preserve the unique shape, flavour and content of Inuit art.

“We have to keep the art alive,” said Qiatsuk, 45, whose print “Dancing Walrus” is on the cover of the current Nunavut phonebook. “We have to keep the art alive because… it shows piqqusingit Inuit [Inuit ways].”

The group’s current exhibit puts Inuit legends and symbols on psychedelic display, with incandescent waves of green, ochre and orange painting the backgrounds of their prints. The artists enhance the colours with a lesser-used print-making technique employing vinyl floor tiles.

Each work touches on familiar Inuit or northern themes such as hunting, the Northern lights, and drum dancing, each a part of the artists storied lives.

“It’s what we’ve seen growing up,” said Pitseolak. “It’s like history.”

The exhibit continues to May 19.