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.
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.
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
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, 2nd 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.
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