This year’s Art Toronto will take place from October 24 to 27, and we’re highlighting the Inuit artwork you need to see at the 2024 show!
Among a host of galleries from across the country celebrating Inuit art and artists, this year’s feature programming will include a platform talk on Saturday, October 26, about the rise of the circumpolar art scene. The talk will feature former Inuit Art Quarterly editor Emily Henderson, now Associate Curator, Indigenous Art and Culture at the McMichael Canadian Art Collection. The fair’s Focus exhibition, the place to which we return, curated by Rhéanne Chartrand, will also include Inuit art from Qamani’tuaq textile artist Annie Taipana, courtesy of Robert Kardosh Gallery.
Read on to learn which exhibitor booths you should visit if you’re keen on Inuit art.
COOPER COLE
Maureen Gruben Polaroid (2023) Packing foam, polar bear fur, suede and pearl pins 31.8 × 49.5 cm COURTESY COOPER COLE PHOTO JESSANN REECE © THE ARTIST
Toronto gallery COOPER COLE will again showcase work by Inuvialuk artist Maureen Gruben. This year includes a photographic work alongside a selection of sculptural pieces such as What took you so long? (2023), a foam polar bear head made to look like taxidermy, and Polaroid (2023), a combination of pink packing foam and polar bear fur made to look like a picture.
In her practice, Gruben uses a mix of materials such as fur hides, skins and bones harvested from her home community of Tuktuyaaqtuuq, Inuvialuit Settlement Region, NT, alongside manufactured materials like wires, Velcro and bubble wrap. Her pieces, from installation to performance art, contain themes of environmentalism and Indigenous hunting rights.
Gruben devotees are also able to catch the artist’s work elsewhere in Toronto, as part of a large-scale mural installation on the outside of OCAD University’s Onsite Gallery.
Feheley Fine Arts
Jessica Winters My Mom, Beading (2024) Oil on canvas 91.4 × 91.4 cm COURTESY FEHELEY FINE ARTS © THE ARTIST
Feheley Fine Arts, also local to Toronto, will mark its 25th Art Toronto with a selection of pieces from a number of Inuit artists. New works will be on view from Kinngait Studios favourites like Ningiukulu Teevee, winner of the 2023 Kenojuak Ashevak Memorial Award, as well as Saimaiyu Akesuk, Pitseolak Qimirpik, Ooloosie Saila, Quvianaqtuk Pudlat and Shuvinai Ashoona, RCA.
The Feheley booth will also showcase a selection of pieces from artists outside of Kinngait, such as Nunatsiavummiuk painter and textile artist Jessica Winters and multidisciplinary artist Darcie Bernhardt from Tuktuuyaqtuuq, Inuvialuit Settlement Region, NT.
Galerie C.O.A
Pitseolak Qimirpik 244-0163 (2024) Coloured pencil on paper 38.1 × 58.4 cm COURTESY GALERIE C.O.A. © THE ARTIST
Hailing from Montreal, QC, Galerie C.O.A. will be playing host to a selection of artworks from Kinngait, NU, artist Pitseolak Qimirpik. The subject of a solo exhibition this summer at the gallery, Qimirpik’s wildly colourful graphic artworks have signalled a marked departure in his practice from stone to coloured pencil and other mediums, although the subject matters of humour and pop culture remain constant companions in this new work.
“I wanted to do something fun,” Qimirpik told the IAQ’s Jessica MacDonald in a forthcoming interview about the shift. Keep an eye out for his spotted fish, stripy insects and overall psychedelic aesthetic at the Galerie C.O.A booth!
Norberg Hall
Kablusiak Left: I Surround You (2024) Right: I Am Made From You (2024) Felt and embroidery floss 15.2 × 15.2 cm eachCOURTESY NORBERG HALL © THE ARTIST
Calgary, AB-based gallery Norberg Hall will showcase a selection of new artworks from Kablusiak, the 2023 Sobey Art Award winner whose multidisciplinary practice reflects on topics like contemporary Indigeneity, cultural displacement and mental health.
Their featured works include Doll 5 (2024), a sealskin ookpik doll that builds on their early work with playful ookpiks, incorporating red sealskin, a leather harness and moveable eyes that open and close as the doll is tilted. Also on view will be Going to the Grocery Store (2023) and I surround you / I am made from you (2024), two felt pieces that depict a northern shopping scene and familiar cat figures respectively.
Olga Korper Gallery
Katherine Takpannie Ookpik | ᐅᒃᐱᒃ #1 (2023) Archival pigment ink print Dimensions variable COURTESY OLGA KORPER © THE ARTIST
Olga Korper Gallery, based in Toronto, is bringing a selection of works from talented photographer Katherine Takpannie’s recent solo show Itiitiq | ᐃᑏᑎᖅ (2024). Takpannie is a photographer and writer currently based in Ottawa, ON, whose work features intimate portraits of women as well as performative and political gestures set against natural and built environments.
Takpannie won the 2020 Next Generation Photography Award and two years later her work was showcased on an award-winning cover for IAQ’s Winter 2022 issue. In this most recent collection of images, Takpannie has shifted to self-portraiture, becoming her own model in a series of daring poses set across the floe edge in Iqaluit, NU, as well as other natural environments.
Robert Kardosh Gallery
Erin Ggaadimits Ivalu Gingrich Molting Natchiq from Sitŋasauq (2022) Basswood, acrylic paint and glass beads 8.9 × 27.9 × 40.6 cm © THE ARTIST
Robert Kardosh Gallery (formerly Marion Scott Gallery) will travel to the fair from Vancouver, BC, bringing a mix of works, including some new names for the gallery. Koyukon Dené and Iñupiaq artist Erin Ggaadimits Ivalu Gingrich will debut the sculptural work Molting Natchiq from Sitŋasauq (2022) with the gallery, which was also featured in IAQ’s Fall 2024 issue on Arctic Indigenous Futurisms.
You’ll also find work by familiar names like Shuvinai Ashoona, RCA, and Megan Kyak-Monteith at the booth, alongside older-generation artists like John Kavik (1897–1993), John Pangnark (1920–1980) and many more.
Bonus!
Inuit Art Foundation at Art Toronto
You’ll also be able to catch team members from the Inuit Art Foundation and the Inuit Art Quarterly in the Content section of Art Toronto alongside other Canadian art publications. We’ll be selling subscriptions and back issues at special rates only available to attendees—come say hi!