Pipelines and resource extraction

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Today’s blog post considers the context for Alootook Ipellie’s political cartoons from the 1970s on pipelines and resource extraction. Ipellie was truly a visionary with this artwork as it is hard to believe that these drawings are not contemporary. In this blog post we will explore how Ipellie’s work was relevant both to his time and to today’s current events.

Pipeline construction in Canada began in the 1860s, with inter-provincial pipelines starting in the mid-20th century, and expanding in the 1970s. The first environmental concerns around their construction started after oil spills along the Trans Mountain pipeline in Jasper National Park and Merritt, B.C. raised alarm within the communities affected by the spill, including Indigenous communities. The earliest protests to stop the expansion of oil pipelines arose as a result of the environmental implications of the spills and led to talks about the issue throughout Canada. Despite these environmental concerns, the federal government approved the extension of the Inter-provincial pipeline system from Sarnia, Ontario to Montreal. Immediately after the approval, Ontario farmers resisted its construction.

The construction of major inter-provincial pipelines was not only debated in B.C. and Ontario during the 1970s. In the North, the Mackenzie Valley gas pipeline proposal was opposed by Indigenous communities of the region. They cited environmental damages that could compromise their water and hunting lands, therefore putting their survival in jeopardy. Other environmental conservation groups joined the Indigenous protests, arguing that the pipelines were constructed in lands where the Indigenous peoples relied on the wildlife, in addition to the implications the pipeline would have for the unresolved land claims that existed in the territories. These are concerns to which Alootook Ipellie’s cartoons Northern Gas Pipeline (1977) and Northern Oil Fields (1978) respond.

Ipellie’s cartoons also have connotations in today’s political climate as objections to the expansion of pipeline construction and hydroelectric dams have grown. Three of the most recent protests include the North Dakota Standing Rock, Manitoba hydroelectric dam protest in Winnipeg, and the Wet’suwet’en protests. All of these demonstrations grapple with issues closely related to the concerns that Ipellie’s raises in his art.

The construction of the now infamous Dakota Access Pipeline gained international attention thanks to protests conducted by the local Native American people of Standing Rock, who were supported by other Indigenous peoples and environmental groups. Concerns around the pipeline began when the U.S Army Corps of Engineers accepted the proposal for its construction on Native land. Youth from Standing Rock Sioux set up a water protectors’ camp on their land in 2016. Ipellie’s cartoon addresses a similar issue as we see Indigenous people guard the door to the northern oil fields. Standing Rock Sioux argued that the Dakota Access Pipeline violates Article II of the Fort Laramie Treaty, which guarantees them use and occupation of reservation lands surrounding the proposed location of the pipeline. Standing Rock Sioux Tribe leaders passed a resolution stating that "the Dakota Access Pipeline poses a serious risk to the very survival of our Tribe and ... would destroy valuable cultural resources.” Hundreds of arrests happened during these protests as well as violent clashes with the police.

Last fall, Manitoba Indigenous leader and activists protested the impact of hydroelectric development on Indigenous lands. Following a discussion at the University of Winnipeg about the expansion and the limitations of hydroelectric power, the group protested the fact that not enough is being done to protect Indigenous communities from the negative impacts of the expansion of this industry. Dams that Manitoba Hydro is proposing to construct are often on sacred and disputed lands, and they would disrupt the animals and water access for many of the northern communities that depend on hunting and fishing for survival.

The most recent and ongoing demonstration is the Wet’suwet’en protest. Although the Coastal Gas Link pipeline that would run through the traditional Wet’suwet’en territory was approved by the nation’s elected band council, it is opposed by the hereditary chiefs. As with other pipeline opposition, the hereditary chiefs and supporting environmental groups cite the great damage the pipeline would cause to the ecosystems and the land the clan depends on for their survival.

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It is not hard to place Ipellie’s criticism of governments and energy corporations over the construction of pipelines on Indigenous lands in this context. During the 1970s, Nunavummiut leaders united to advocate for Inuit political autonomy, asserting the right to a comprehensive land claim and the establishment of a separate Nunavut territory. All across the continent Indigenous peoples have asserted their independence and continued to fight for their right to their traditional lands. These actions have been another strategy to ensure protection of their territories from invasive and detrimental resource extraction projects such as pipelines and hydro dams. In today’s political climate, Ipellie continues to be seen as an innovative artist; his political cartoons defend Indigenous rights and criticize the governments and corporations that violate the sacred land for profit.

Post author: Magnolia Valles Duran

Sources: 

Sandra Dyck, Heather Igloliorte and Christine Lalonde, Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border, exhibition section panel, 2018. 

Office of the Wet'suwet'en. Accessed March 28, 2020.

“The Wet'suwet'en and B.C.'s Gas-Pipeline Battle: A Guide to the Story so Far,” The Globe and Mail, January 8, 2019. Accessed March 28, 2020.

Sean Kheraj, “The complicated history of building pipelines in Canada,” May 30, 2018. The Conversation. Accessed March 28, 2020.

Naaman Sturrup, “One Last Look at Alootook,” The Uniter, March 5, 2020. Accessed March 28, 2020.

Caroline Rosenthal, “Locations of North in Canadian Literature and Culture,” Gesellschaft für Kanada-Studien. Accessed March 28, 2020.

Sheila Watt-Cloutier, “Climate Change in the Arctic,” Inuktitut, Issue 102 (January 2007). Accessed March 28, 2020.

Images: Alootook Ipellie, Northern Oil Fields (1978), ink on paper, Collection of Richard F. Brush Gallery at St. Lawrence University. Photo: Karen Asher.

Alootook Ipellie, Northern Gas Pipeline (1977), ink on paper, Collection of Richard F. Brush Gallery at St. Lawrence University. Photo: Karen Asher.

I'm splittin'

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We end the week by continuing Wednesday’s consideration of Alootook Ipellie’s cartoons published in Inuit Today magazine in the 1970s. In addition to a comic strip series that followed the adventures of the Nook family, Ipellie created what he called “filler” comics. The curators of his touring retrospective exhibition Walking on Both Sides of an Invisible Border observe that:

These smart editorial cartoons often followed the context of the magazine’s articles, even the content of the pages upon which they were printed, expressing the artist’s distinct views on the conversations presented. Ipellie tackled challenging topics, including climate change, sovereignty, colonialism, politics and housing. As he said in an interview in 1995, ‘If I am thinking about something that is affecting my people in some way, then if I can somehow make it simpler in one picture, or one cartoon, then maybe I can help people understand it better and have a laugh at the same time.’ 

In the cartoon at the top of this post, known as “I’m splittin’”, Ipellie once again turns to satire as he cheekily references Robert Flaherty, the ethnographic filmmaker who was notorious for his pseudo-documentary Nanook of the North (1922). On Monday’s blog post, Adele Ruhdorfer shared how Flaherty captured the imagination of North American and European settlers with his purposely misleading portrayal of Inuit society and people as static and naïve, thereby perpetuating negative and outdated stereotypes. One of the key plot lines in Flaherty’s film is the re-creation of a seal hunt where he insisted that the character Nanook – portrayed by lead actor Allakariallak – use a harpoon rather than the rifle that he had been accustomed to hunting with.

In Ipellie’s cartoon, the filmmaker is an Inuk who holds both a video camera and a rifle as he films his polar bear protagonist. There are some witty double entendres in this scenario. For example, the name that Flaherty gave to his film’s main character, “Nanook”, means “polar bear” in Inuktitut. Ipellie offers a funny and literal interpretation by substituting a human with a polar bear as his lead actor. Further, the filmmaker is literally ready to “shoot footage” of his subject with a gun and a camera in his hands.

The thought bubbles in this comic indicate a telling miscommunication between the two characters. This miscommunication reveals an underlying reversal of power wherein the bear actor expresses his agency and resistance by walking away from and refusing to participate in the staged scene, while the human filmmaker is shown to be dogged and naive in thinking he is getting great coverage. If we think of the bear as a stand-in for Allakariallak and Inuit more generally and the human as a substitute for Flaherty and settlers, then this is a light-hearted yet clever and coded strategy that Ipellie uses to dismantle power inequities between Qallunaaq and Inuit.

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Another of Ipellie’s single frame comics from this era points to the absurdity of paternalistic attitudes toward Inuit held by settlers. On the right, a Qallunaaq is speaking to an Inuk. The height differences between the two figures suggests that the taller person is an adult while the shorter person is a child. The Qallunaaq holds a harpoon and a small axe in his hands and tells the Inuk that these items “belonged to your 25^th great-grandfather.” Once again, there is a communication disconnect between the two characters as the Inuk scratches his head in bewilderment, disbelief or even exasperation at what the Qallunaaq is saying. Ipellie’s readers must have chuckled at the ignorance of a non-Inuk haughtily portaining to teach them about their own culture, an encounter they may have experienced themselves on one too many occasions.

A second, underlying narrative implied by this cartoon is the excavation and removal of Inuit material culture from their original territories followed by their placement in museum collections located in the south. Today, this remains an ongoing concern as Inuit advocate for the creation of the Nunavut Heritage Centre in Ipellie’s hometown of Iqaluit and the subsequent repatriation of Inuit artifacts.

These two examples of Alootook Ipellie’s self-described “filler comics” from the 1970s show how the artist used his quick wit to poke fun at oppressive settler-colonial attitudes thereby expressing the resilience of his people.

Post author: Jennifer Gibson

Sources:

Sandra Dyck, Heather Igloliorte and Christine Lalonde, Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border, exhibition section panel, 2018.

Michael P. J. Kennedy, “Alootook Ipellie: The Voice of an Inuk Artist,” Studies in Canadian Literature (Volume 21, Number 2), 1996. Accessed March 21, 2020.

Amy Prouty, “Drawing Inuit Satiric Resilience: Alootook Ipellie’s Decolonial Comics,” esse, Number 93 (Spring 2018). Accessed March 21, 2020.

Images: Alootook Ipellie, [I’m splittin’], published in Inuit Today, October 1976, ink on paper, estate of the artist. Photo by Justin Wonnacott, courtesy of Carleton University Art Gallery. Detail of Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border, exhibit installation at Gallery 1C03 showing the comic [your 25^th great-grandfather] published in Inuit Today (1974-1981). Photo by Karen Asher.

Ice Box

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Today's blog post considers Alootook Ipellie's first comic strip, Ice Box. In an interview with University of Saskatchewan English professor Michael Kennedy, Ipellie discussed the emergence of his career as a visual artist. He relates how he sold his first pen and ink drawings in the late-1960s after returning to Iqaluit briefly following a year at a vocational high school in Ottawa. The sale of these pieces spurred him to create more, but it was not until he started working for Inuit Monthly magazine (later renamed Inuit Today) that he became more serious about drawing.

In the didactic material for the exhibition Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border, exhibition curators Sandra Dyck, Heather Igloliorte and Christine Lalonde write:

As a child, even before he could read English, Ipellie was enthralled by comic books from the South and dreamed of growing up to be a cartoonist. He realized this dream when he began working in the early 1970s for Inuit Monthly, a bilingual magazine (Inuktitut and English) published by Inuit Tapirisat of Canada (now Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami). He first published his two-panel Ice Box comics in the January 1974 issue. He described the idea of Ice Box as a “mixture of the two cultures” in which “you’ll see the setting is the Arctic, but the storyline itself is very often from the South.” The strip follows the daily life of the Nook family in the North. Through the Nooks, Ipellie explored the social and political issues facing Northerners at that time, with often biting satire about the state of contemporary culture.

As suggested above, Inuit Today was distributed across the North and its primary audience was other Inuit. The content, the tone, the bilingual nature of the magazine and, by extension, Ipellie’s comics, reflect this. Nearly five decades following their initial publication, we are fortunate to be able to consider the rich and layered perspective his cartoons continue to offer.

Ipellie’s mastery of the comic form is evident in this example from an undated Ice Box comic strip sequence he drew between 1974 and 1981. Here, he reveals an unexpected and humorous plot in just four frames while simultaneously providing readers with clues that firmly situate the scene in modern times. This particular sequence also points to recurring sub-themes in Ipellie’s art.

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In the first panel, parka-clad Papa Nook walks toward a large set of caribou antlers poking out of the snow-covered Arctic tundra. His thought bubble reads, “Holy geepers! I don’t believe it! The good lord has done it again!” Grasping one of the antlers in the second panel he thinks, “It’ll take me a year to carve figurines on this. It’s enormous!” The following frame shows Papa Nook struggling to remove the antlers from the snow which we can see are still attached to the caribou’s head. He wonders “What on earth is going on here? I’ve heard of funny stories about ‘flying antlers’ at Christmas – but this is taking it a bit too far!” In the final panel, Papa Nook sits atop the live caribou who is upright on its back legs. Papa says “Oh well, what the heck! If you can’t beat ‘em – join ‘em! Hi-yo! Silverrr Away!”

Ipellie matter-of-factly indicates the presence of Christianity in the Arctic in the first panel as Papa Nook uses the words “holy geepers” and “good lord.” It is reinforced by the appearance of a cross on his parka in panel two and again with his reference to “flying antlers at Christmas” in panel three. Though this cartoon sequence may not overtly suggest it, Ipellie often incorporated Christian iconography and narratives in his drawing and writing to critique the devastating impacts of the church on Inuit.

Alongside colonial religious references, Ipellie incorporates icons of American popular culture who would have been familiar to his Inuit readers in the 1970s. This time, he invokes the Lone Ranger. This is an especially interesting choice as it gives him the opportunity to cheekily allude to the history of the very medium in which he works: the Lone Ranger was a radio and television program, but it also existed as a comic. He also uses the Lone Ranger reference to upend racial expectations and re-appropriate popular symbols for Inuit: Papa Nook is not portrayed as Tonto but, rather, as an Indigenized version of the Lone Ranger.

Papa Nook’s intended use of the antlers as a decorative carving surface in panel two also refers to the modern era. It implies the existence of an art market which was encouraged by the federal government as an economic initiative to provide alternative income for Inuit who had been forced to settle in communities. Cooperatives supporting the creation of art and craft were formed in several Arctic communities starting in the late 1950s. Until recently, sculptures in stone, bone and ivory as well as prints and wallhangings have been the most widely promoted media. Scenes of pre-contact life and images of Arctic fauna and landscapes were strongly favoured until the end of the 20^th century.

As an artist who was Inuit, Ipellie found himself an outsider of this system. He lived in the South, made line drawings in pen and ink, and addressed unique, even provocative, themes and content in his creative work. In the introduction to his book Arctic Dreams and Nightmares (1993), he suspects that this is why the “stewards of Inuit art” were uninterested in his drawings. Fortunately, their rejections only spurred on his resolve to continue to produce the type of art that he loved. As Amy Prouty notes, Ipellie continued “tirelessly to create works that challenged stereotypes about Inuit and the primacy of Qallunaat ideologies over Inuit knowledge.” 

Post author: Jennifer Gibson

Sources:

Sandra Dyck, Heather Igloliorte and Christine Lalonde, Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border, exhibition introduction section panel, 2018.

Michael P. J. Kennedy, “Alootook Ipellie: The Voice of an Inuk Artist,” Studies in Canadian Literature (Volume 21, Number 2), 1996. Accessed March 21, 2020.

Amy Prouty, “Drawing Inuit Satiric Resilience: Alootook Ipellie’s Decolonial Comics,” esse, Number 93 (Spring 2018). Accessed March 21, 2020.

Images: Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border, exhibit installation at Gallery 1C03 showing group of Ice Box comic strip cartoons published in Inuit Today (1974-1981).  Detail of previous image. Photos by Karen Asher.

Inutsiaq

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In today’s blog post we will be taking a closer look at one of the most important people in Alootook Ipellie’s life: his maternal grandfather, Inutsiaq. Due to a strained relationship with his parents, brought on by a cycle of familial separation due to seeking medical treatment in the South and the alcoholism of his step-father, Ipellie lived with his grandparents from the ages of 10 to 15. During this time, he found peace, security, and acceptance in their loving home. Yet, he had to be separated from his family once more, to attend school in Ottawa. As an adult, Ipellie continued to pay tribute to his grandfather, even modelling his own life after him. For, Inutsiaq was also a gifted artist – he was a celebrated sculptor and storyteller with shamanic abilities. Yet, while Inutsiaq rejected these shamanic powers and converted to Christianity, we will learn in a later blogpost how Ipellie rejected these colonizing strategies, to instead fuse elements of Christianity with Inuit shamanism, in his seminal book Arctic Dreams and Nightmares. In Alootook’s portrait of his grandfather he also rejects a colonial strategy, namely, that of the colonial gaze and misrepresentation of Inuit people.

As an artist, writer, and activist, Ipellie desired to represent Inuit culture as living and continuously developing. He rejected the anthropological idea that Inuit culture was archaic and on the verge of extinction. Evidence of this idea is seen in Ipellie’s depictions of his grandfather, as he decides to re-appropriate a photograph taken by Robert Flaherty.

You may recognize the name ‘Robert Flaherty’. He is most well-known as the American filmmaker who produced the first commercially successful feature-length ethnographic documentary film, Nanoook of the North (1922). Nanook of the North follows the life of the character Nanook and his family, as they travel, search for food, and engage in trade. Both the mundane and the heroic are explored. Viewers see them build an igloo, perform their daily tasks, and hunt in extreme weather conditions. This film captured the attention of a wide audience in America and Europe. They were incredibly fascinated by the daily lives of Inuit, which felt so distant and remarkable to them. But, of course, this film is more akin to a romanticized and staged drama than it is to a truthful and documentarian representation of life in the Arctic. Although the film presents itself as an ethnographic documentary about the everyday lives of Inuit, Flaherty’s main goal was to analyze the core theme of humanity’s relationship with nature and our innate instinct for survival. In doing so, he created a “primal drama,” in which the theme of survival is transmitted in a dramatic and simplified narrative. Viewers were able to deduce this theme easily, as the film follows a narrative format that was already recognizable to them. Therefore, the film is less about the specificities of Arctic living, but rather a representation of Flaherty’s generalized vision of humanity.

The depictions of Inuit life in Flaherty’s film are in fact not consistent with actual lived experiences of the people that he portrayed. Instead Flaherty offers up a romantic framing of the way life might have been about fifty to one hundred years prior to the creation of this film. It’s worth noting, that due to the limitations of film equipment at the time, there was no way Flaherty could have documented these scenes without staging them. He and the actors staged the scenes, practiced them, and then filmed them in short sequences. Yet, Flaherty went a step further in dramatizing the narrative, by deciding to represent a version of Inuit life from a century prior. The choice to recreate an outdated way of living was deliberate on Flaherty’s part, as it would further reinforce the main theme of survival in harsh conditions. For instance, the infamous scene of the seal hunt, the climax of the film, would not have been quite as dramatic and awe-inspiring to Western viewers, had Nanook used a rifle. Yet, by the 1920s, Inuit had already been hunting with rifles for quite some time, even abandoning traditional subsistence practices. Not only did these choices create more intrigue for a Western/Southern audience, but they also effectively concealed and naturalized the effects of Western contact. While his representations of Indigenous people seem more positive and celebratory, compared to others at the same time, he still chose not to celebrate the truth. He erased all evidence of colonialism and created an illusion of Western innocence. Some scholars even suggest, that by depicting the well-recognized Western ideals of a nuclear family, the domesticity and submissiveness of women, and the strength and bravery of men, these social constructs become naturalized for the intended Western audience. Viewers could see their lives mirrored back to them, even in the most distant parts of the world! It’s possible that these sorts of romanticized depictions also served to dismiss some of the goals of the suffragist movements, as the social order of their life is presented as innately human in this so-called documentary film. In constructing a film to fit within his own ideologies, Flaherty creates an ethnocentric representation of Inuit, as his portrayals originate from within the social principles of his culture, not their own.

Similarly, in Flaherty’s photograph of Alootook Ipellie’s grandfather, Inutsiaq, he centres the Western ideal of individualism. The horizontal black and white photograph is a classic head and shoulder portrait of Inutsiaq. He looks directly into the camera with a steely, but kind gaze. He is wearing a sealskin jacket, with the hood folded down, exposing his long, dark hair to the wind. Besides the wind blowing through Inutsiaq’s hair, there is no other indicator of the Arctic environment or any of the changes that impacted Inuit ways of living. While this portrayal is not a negative representation, Inutsiaq is alone in this frame, without anyone or anything to ground him.

In contrast, in Ipellie’s rendition of his grandfather, he includes additional elements to ground Inutsiaq in the Arctic community. Ipellie has divided his illustration in two parts, with the reference to Flaherty’s photograph taking up the top two-thirds, while five children of varying ages take up the bottom third. Inutsiaq is drawn in a minimalist style with a great deal of negative space. Clean lines frame his face and fur coat. Most of the details are drawn in his hair, where Ipellie creates contrast, depth, and texture with numerous thin lines. Although this rendition is an illustration, this effect feels less flat than the reference photograph, where all the grays blend together. Then, in the foreground, five young children are visible. They are wearing Western mass-produced clothing, reminiscent of the 1980s and 1990s: graphic t-shirts and sweaters, woolen knits with plastic buttons, jeans, cotton pants, and running shoes. Yet, despite the differences in attire between Inutsiaq and the children, what grounds them across time and space is community. Inutsiaq – and other elders like him – serve an important purpose in Inuit and Indigenous communities. They are the storytellers, the ones who pass on their oral histories, geographies, and life lessons to the next generation. The next generation may need to adapt to a different way of living, but that does not mean they cannot continue to be grounded in Inuit ways of knowing.

Elders like Inutsiaq allowed Alootook Ipellie to become gifted in his art and activism. They are the ones who paved the way. Ipellie drew upon his heritage and made every effort to reject the misrepresentation of Inuit. Yet, he always centred contemporary life in all of his work, acknowledging the impact of continued colonial contact. His life and art were always punctuated by being both Inuit and having to navigate life in a Western/Southern society. By acknowledging the hybridity of his own experiences, he ensured that he would not misrepresent his own culture and pander to the illusory and romanticized narratives created for a Western audience. It would be dishonest to represent life in any other way.

Post author: Adele Ruhdorfer

Sources and Further Reading:
Sandra Dyck, Heather Igloliorte and Christine Lalonde, Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border, exhibition introduction section panel, 2018.

Alootook Ipellie, "Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border," in An Anthology of Canadian Native Literature in English, 2^nd edition, 1998.

Kimberley McMahon-Coleman, "Dreaming An Identity between Two Cultures: The Works of Alootook Ipellie," Kunapipi (Volume 28, Issue 1, Article 12), 2006.

John W. Burton,and Caitlin W. Thompson. "Nanook and Kirwinians: Deception, Authenticity, and the Birth of Modern Ethnographic Representation," Film History (Volume 14, Issue 1, 74-86), 2002.

Shari M. Huhndorf, “Nanook and His Contemporaries: Imagining Eskimos in American Culture, 1897-1922,” Critical Inquiry (Volume 27, Issue 1, 122-148), 2000.

Alan Marcus, "Nanook of the North as Primal Drama," Visual Anthropology (Volume 19, 201-222), 2006.

Images: Alootook Ipellie, Untitled (circa 1987), ink on paper, collection of Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated; Robert Flaherty (American, 1884-1951), Portrait of Enutsiak (1913-14), contemporary print from vintage negative, Library and Archives Canada/Robert and Frances Flaherty, MIKAN 3200003, Courtesy of the Robert and Frances Flaherty Study Centre, Claremont School of Theology, Claremont, CA 91711. Photo: Karen Asher.

The two sides of Alootook Ipellie

In this blog post we will take a close look at Alootook Ipellie's self-portrait titled The Death of Nomadic Life, the Creeping Emergence of Civilization, examining how this drawing -- created during the last year of his life -- addresses various aspects of the artist's complex and multi-layered identity.

Alootook Ipellie often described himself in terms of dualities: as a “nomad wearing civilized clothes”/ with a face “split in two halves – one Inuk the other Qallunaaq”/ “living in two different worlds”/ “walking both sides of an invisible border.” He wears caribou skin clothing, holds a harpoon and bloody hunting knife, with his back to the land, the sky, his past. His body is partially obscured by an upright frame made of narwhal tusks, inside of which he exists in the present, wearing a tuxedo and bow tie, tickets to an Elvis Presley concert in Ottawa poking out of his pocket, and a pint of beer at the ready. The drawing powerfully expresses Ipellie's ambivalence toward his divided identity, it was never either/or, but always both.

The curatorial statement above expresses many conflicts but also highlights themes present throughout the exhibition. Consider the term "Qallunaaq." This is the Inuktitut word that translates roughly to "non-Inuk" or "Southerner" in English. As mentioned in the first blog post,  Ipellie was born in a traditional hunting camp on the land at Nuvuqquq on Baffin Island, but he moved with his family to the community of Iqaluit as a child. At age five, he was sent to a sanatorium in Hamilton, Ontario to be treated for tuberculosis before returning to Iqaluit. In 1967, Ipellie moved to Ottawa to attend high school where he spent the majority of his adult life.

These experiences forced Ipellie to incorporate the ways of Qallunnaat, from learning to speak English to wearing southern clothing and much more. This is suggested in the middle of his self portrait as he sports Qallunaat attire of a tuxedo. Dressed as an urban Inuk in this formal wear, Ipellie is ready for a night out on the town. We might infer from the tickets in his pocket that he is headed to a concert featuring the king of rock n' rock himself, Elvis Presley. Elvis represents the epitome of American pop culture in the mid-20th century, the time at which Ipellie was born. As a performing artist, Elvis was an innovator and a rebel, breaking new ground in popular music by combining various genres and causing controversy with his sensual, hip-swinging dance moves. Elvis was also part Indigenous. Perhaps he was someone with whom Ipellie could identify.

Ipellie has drawn a pint of beer onto the left lapel of his tuxedo. Alcohol is also a signifier of southern society as it was introduced to Inuit by Qallunnaat, often causing much harm. Ipellie has stated that his stepfather was an alcoholic who treated him badly when he was drinking. In a number of his other artworks, including some of his comics and his drawing and accompanying story Arctic Dreams and Nightmares (1993), Ipellie references the negative impacts of alcohol on the body and mind.

On his right lapel, we see a small image of four Inuit wearing parkas. They appear to be holding hands or dancing. In fact, this is the logo of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, a non-profit advocacy organization representing the four regions of Inuit Nunangat (Inuvialuit, Nunavut, Nunavik, and Nunatsiavut). Ipellie worked for ITK for many years. In the 1970s and 1980s, he was translator and then editor of their publication Inuit Monthly (later titled Inuit Today). This is also where Ipellie's first comic strip, Ice Box, was published, in addition to many of his early single panel cartoons.

As we draw our attention to the artist's face, we notice the pupils of his eyes are animal-like vertical slits and his hair is covered in black dots. Perhaps these circles refer to the spotted seal. Ipellie strongly defended Inuit seal hunting rights in his comics and other writings. In one of the drawings and stories for his book Arctic Dreams and Nightmares, he turns the tables on animal rights activist Brigitte Bardot who once condemned the Inuit seal hunt.

On either side of the narwhal tusks Ipellie shows himself in the past, as a hunter, wearing a traditional caribou fur parka and holding hunting implements. We read the black substance on his knife as the blood of a recently killed animal. The blood drips toward the ground, but some of it flows onto his right hand and down his wrist as a thick black line. As if by magic, this line re-appears on his left wrist and hand. It multiplies and spreads like veins and arteries that map the flow of his own blood through his body.

If we interpret this image via the inseparable duality to which Ipellie refers in his poem "Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border," perhaps the knife can also be considered a pen and the blood is the ink that flows from it. Just as the hunting knife would have been integral to his existence in the past, so too is the ink pen inseparable from his life and identity as an urban Inuk.

We end this post with some words from Alootook:

So I am left to fend for myself

Walking in two different worlds

Trying my best to make sense

Of two opposing cultures

Which are unable to integrate

Lest they swallow one another whole


Post authors: Jennifer Gibson and Dana Lance

Sources: 
Sandra Dyck, Heather Igloliorte and Christine Lalonde, Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border, exhibition introduction section panel, 2018

Alootook Ipellie, "Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border," in An Anthology of Canadian Native Literature in English, 2^nd edition, 1998

Kimberley McMahon-Coleman, "Dreaming An Identity between Two Cultures: The Works of Alootook Ipellie," Kunapipi (Volume 28, Issue 1, Article 12), 2006.

Image: Alootook Ipellie (1951-2007), The Death of Nomadic Life, The Creeping Emergence of Civilization, (2007), Ink on illustration Board. Estate of the artist. Photo by Justin Wonnacott, courtesy Carleton University Art Gallery.

Alootook Ipellie

Today we begin the first in a series of blog posts on Inuit artist and writer Alootook Ipellie, whose work is featured in the touring exhibition Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border which was on view at Gallery 1C03 from February 27 - March 13, 2020. This exhibition has been produced by Carleton University Art Gallery and curated by Sandra Dyck, Heather Igloliorte and Christine Lalonde. It is the first retrospective of this remarkable artist and it draws from the many facets of his exceptional career.

So, who was Alootook Ipellie?

Alootook Ipellie (1951–2007) was born at Nuvuqquq on Baffin Island and raised in Iqaluit. He moved to Ottawa in the late 1960s to attend high school and spent most of his adult life there, working as an artist, writer, cartoonist, editor, illustrator and journalist.

The exhibition’s title refers to Ipellie’s poem of the same name, published in An Anthology of Canadian Literature in English (2^nd edition, 1998) and available to read on the website Poetry in Voice.

Indeed, Ipellie’s diverse and prodigious body of work is defined, at its heart, by his lifelong struggle to reconcile the two worlds in which he lived. As he writes in his poem, “I did not ask to be born an Inuk, nor did I ask to be forced to learn an alien culture with an alien language.” Everyday survival on this border, he said, sometimes required “fancy dancing.”

Alootook Ipellie once joked that he had a “Ph.D. in Silentology,” but his work was not quiet, nor was it created at an emotional remove. He identified his “tools of operation” as “the power of the written word and the spilling of India ink on illustration board.” His job, he said, was to “interpret the imagination.”

With great wit, passion and sensitivity, Ipellie gave voice to significant issues affecting Inuit Nunangat. His work feels prescient because it addresses topics that are still urgent, such as political sovereignty, climate change, resource extraction and the ongoing impact of colonization.

Alootook Ipellie’s work was disseminated widely in magazines like Inuit Monthly, Inuit Today and Nunatsiaq News, and in books including Paper Stays Put (1980) and the extraordinary Arctic Dreams and Nightmares (1993). But he never found a place in the “so-called Inuit Art World,” as he described it, working outside the co-op system and without the benefit of an art dealer. He nonetheless considered himself fortunate to spend his days writing and drawing. As Ipellie said, “We humans have to wonder how the world may have turned out if it weren’t blessed with the creativity of its artists.”

Source:
Sandra Dyck, Heather Igloliorte and Christine Lalonde, Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border, exhibition introduction panel, 2018.

Photo of Alootook Ipellie by John MacDonald.

Gallery closure and blog resumption

To help prevent the spread of COVID-19, The University of Winnipeg has suspended all in-person classes and closed all non-essential services.

Gallery 1C03 is therefore closed until further notice.

Our current exhibition Alootook Ipellie: Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border is closed, and its affiliated programming events -- poetry reading, panel discussion and reception -- have been cancelled. We may re-schedule the poetry reading and panel discussion for a future date and will keep you informed as information becomes available.

In the meantime, we are re-activating this blog to help you learn more about Alootook Ipellie and his work. We will be sharing images and interpretive materials from the exhibition along with supplementary reference materials and our own interpretations and analyses. You can expect to read a new post written by Gallery 1C03 staff every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, starting today.

We will begin the next post with an introduction to the artist and some context for the exhibition.