After a year with limited public access to museums and galleries, you’re probably in greater need than ever of more ways to find Inuit art from the comfort and safety of home. Luckily, many institutions have spent the last year finding new ways to help people access their content online!
If you’ve already devoured parts One and Two in our series on exhibitions available from home, enjoy today’s part Three—featuring enough Inuit art to keep your mind active even as your body melts into the couch.
Alootook Ipellie Panel from serial comic strip Nuna and Vut (1994) Ink on illustration board 25.4 x 38.1 cm COURTESY CARLETON UNIVERSITY ART GALLERY PHOTO JUSTIN WONNACOTT
Walking Both Sides of an Invisible BorderGallery 1C03
Curated by Sandra Dyck, Heather Igloliorte and Christine Lalonde, this first retrospective exhibition of the late Alootook Ipellie’s work draws the many aspects of his career together to demonstrate the continued relevance of his artistic vision. Produced by Carleton University Art Gallery in Ottawa, ON, in 2018, shortly before Ipellie was inducted into the Canadian Cartoonist Hall of Fame, Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border travelled to the Art Gallery of Hamilton in Ontario, the Nunatta Sunakkutaangit Museum in Iqaluit, NU, and the Richard F. Brush Art Gallery in Canton, New York, before arriving at the University of Winnipeg’s Gallery 1C03 in Spring 2020. Although its run there was cut short by the advent of COVID-19 lockdowns, Gallery 1C03 organizers produced a narrated tour of the exhibition and a series of essays that examine the details of specific comics that can be enjoyed from home.
subsistWinnipeg Art Gallery
Featuring work from Maureen Gruben, Mark Igloliorte, Andrew Qappik, Luke Anguhadluq and more, subsist examines the political, economic and social systems involved in the maintenance of traditional sustenance and survival for Indigenous Peoples, with particular emphasis on the seal hunt and Indigenous food sovereignty. The virtual exhibition features an exhibition tour narrated by curators Jaimie Isaac and Jocelyn Piirainen, as well as shots of the artwork and information about the artists. The IAQ’s Napatsi Folger spoke with Isaac and Piirainen to get their vision for the exhibition firsthand.
Arctic: Culture and ClimateBritish Museum
Bringing together contemporary works from artists like Kenojuak Ashevak, Andrew Qappik and Kiliii Yuyan with ancient ivory sculpture and museum artifacts, the British Museum’s Arctic: Culture and Climate aims to highlight the relationship between circumpolar Indigenous people and the Arctic, and how climate change is testing their adaptive capabilities and threatening their way of life. Curated by Amber Lincoln, Jago Cooper and Peter Louvres, the virtual version of this exhibition features a curator-led tour of the space and objects, a curator’s corner examining a singular parka, and an up-close view of several of the central works alongside a programme of “Arctic” exhibition events available to watch on demand. The IAQ spoke with Lincoln to get the inside scoop.
ᖃᓪᓗᓈᖅᑕᐃᑦ ᓯᑯᓯᓛᕐᒥᑦ Printed Textiles from Kinngait StudiosTextile Museum of Canada
Presenting artwork and stories from the artists who participated in the short-lived production of graphic textiles in Kinngait (Cape Dorset), NU, ᖃᓪᓗᓈᖅᑕᐃᑦ ᓯᑯᓯᓛᕐᒥᑦ Printed Textiles from Kinngait Studios brings the 1950s and ’60s textile production face-to-face with Inuit fashion designers working today, like Martha Kyak of Inuk Chic, Nooks Lindell of Hinaani Design, and Tarralik Duffy of Ugly Fish. Curated by Roxane Shaughnessy and produced in partnership with the West Baffin Eskimo Co-operative, the Textile Museum of Canada in Toronto, ON, has a virtual tour available on its website, as well as a specially designed app that allows virtual viewers to navigate the works in their own way and hear directly from the artists with audio and video.
Shuvinai Ashoona Quilt of Dreams (2009) Printmaker Niviaksi Quvianaqtuliaq Lithograph 46.5 x 64 cm Reproduced with permission Dorset Fine Arts © the artist
Inuit Prints from Cape DorsetCanadian Museum of History
Available in English, French and Inuktitut, Inuit Prints from Cape Dorset makes Canada’s national collection of Inuit prints from Kinngait (Cape Dorset), NU, publicly available for research, scholarship and appreciation. Covering the history of Kinngait’s printmaking program alongside the artists’ techniques, major themes of the work and interviews with artists like Kananginak Pootoogook, Kiugak Ashoona and Kenojuak Ashevak, the virtual exhibition also hosts activities for children and educational resources for teachers.
The Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, QC, also hosts a number of other Inuit-focused (and more broadly Indigenous-focused) virtual online hubs from past exhibitions, such as Storytelling: the Art of Knowledge and Lost Visions, Forgotten Dreams.
Bonus!
ᐊᕙᑖᓂᑦ ᑕᒪᐃᓐᓂᑦ ᓄᓇᑐᐃᓐᓇᓂᑦ / Among All These TundrasEsker Foundation
If you read our first guide to visiting museums from home, then you already got a sense for what ᐊᕙᑖᓂᑦ ᑕᒪᐃᓐᓂᑦ ᓄᓇᑐᐃᓐᓇᓂᑦ / Among All These Tundras is about. Now, experience it anew through footage from the Esker Foundation, which the exhibition travelled to in summer 2019. Featuring interviews with celebrated Inuit artists like Couzyn van Heuvelen and Barry Pottle alongside a video tour, this version brings the artists right to you.
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