Nunavik students bring film to international stage

When Madison York speaks about being on the land, she describes it as “happy, free, refreshing” — as well as a “feeling that I can’t explain.”

This year, York, who graduated from Kuujjuaq’s Jaanimmarik School in 2025, will help present a short film based on the land at the UArctic Congress, an international gathering focused on Arctic communities, research and culture.

The forum takes place in Tórshavn, Denmark, and runs from May 26 to 29.

“The land means a lot to us. Back in the day, our ancestors used the stars to make sure they didn’t get lost and the trees for heat,” York said in an interview ahead of the conference. “We respect the land like it’s a person.”

Nunaapivut — Our Beautiful Land captures beluga, caribou, geese and ptarmigan hunting. Sounds of ice, snow, wind and water are also included, painting a full picture of the Arctic.

Jaanimmarik School teacher Jonathan Blais is accompanying the delegation to Denmark for the UArctic Congress. (Photo courtesy of Jonathan Blais)

The film, produced in Inuktitut, French and English, began in November 2024 as a classroom workshop for high school seniors.

The workshop was part of the NUNA, a research project run by researchers and professors in Europe that explores how Inuit youth see and connect with the land through photography and filmmaking.

“It’s really exciting. These are the kind of experiences that may bear other fruits,” said Jaanimarik School teacher Jonathan Blais.

Instead of a single narrator, the students built the film together, with some interviewing elders and others gathering footage.

“Our culture and ways of hunting are different in each community, so we wanted to represent ours and how we do it,” York said.

As a first-year student at Montmorency College in Laval, Que., York says the absence of the land is something she feels deeply.

“On hard days, all I wanted to do was go camping,” she said, adding that the film also centres the voices of elders, whom she described as essential to understanding the Inuit relationship with the land.

The presentation at UArctic is an opportunity to place Nunavik and Inuit culture onto an international stage, York said. Even in Montreal, she noted, many people still ask where Nunavik is.

“It’s an honour to represent and show that we’re here too,” she said.

The delegation presenting the film includes former students York, Annie Lock Morgan and Amy May, accompanied by Blais. The screening is planned for Wednesday.