The Half-Fish

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At the time of his collaboration on his first book Paper Stays Put: A Collection of Inuit Writing, edited by Robin Gedalof and published in 1980, Alootook Ipellie had already established his own distinct style of drawing. While working at Inuit Monthly as a translator, writer, creator of the comic strip Ice Box, designer, photographer and editor, he illustrated and contributed written pieces (including poetry and a story) to the anthology. The curators of the exhibition Alootook Ipellie: Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border write: 

[Paper Stays Put] reflects the complexity and range of the “subjects and styles adopted by Inuit writers,” as Gedalof wrote in the introduction [...] Like his magazine work, Ipellie’s illustrations for Paper Stays Put are precise drawings in black ink that bear witness to his steady hand, confident lines and rich patterns” (Dyck, et al. 7)

The touring exhibition Alootook Ipellie: Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border features five of the illustrations from Paper Stays Put. A viewer familiar with the figure of Nuliajuk, the spirit of the sea, might be captivated by one of these drawings, The Half-Fish. Elder Peter Irniq calls Nuliajuk, “Uinigumasuittuq”, which translates to “one that never wanted to marry” because, in traditional versions of her story, Nuliajuk refuses her father’s orders to choose a partner and instead has babies with a dog. On a kayak trip, her angry father throws her into the sea and when she clings to the side of the kayak, he chops off her fingers. Her fingers become sea mammals. She sinks to the bottom where she now lives, guarded by a dog.

This representation of the story of Nuliajuk (or Sedna, as she is also known) feels both familiar and uncanny, terrifying and inviting. The viewer of the image is privy to quite the scene; a hunter prods the sea spirit who stares at the viewer, sporting an expression of surprise. Harpooning or “catching” Nuliajuk ensures that she will release the sea mammals so that the people may be fed (Oosten 484).

Ipellie’s illustration accompanies a story by a Povungnituk carver, contributed to the anthology by Taivitialuk Alaasuaq. This story “attempts to reconcile the old beliefs with the technology brought North by the white traders” (Gedalof 94). In this version, Nuliajuk is stuck on the shore and is spotted by a hunter. She asks the hunter to help her without touching her, inviting him to instead use the wood he’s harvesting to push her back into the sea. In exchange for this favour, she will reward him. After a lot of effort, the hunter manages to push her back into the water and returns the next day for his reward. The reward comes in the form of a gramophone, sewing machine and gun.

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Ipellie also has his own version of the story in his book Arctic Dreams and Nightmares, published in 1993. His story, titled “Summit with Sedna, Mother of Sea Beasts”, tells of a sexually frustrated Sedna. The shamans meet up and conjure a plan to give her a dream that would satisfy her. The dream ends up featuring the worthy match she never found. While the story featured in Paper Stays Put highlights a tension of the time around technology, this version is more interested in themes of sexuality and gender. Contemporary adaptations like this one ensure and emphasize the enduring relevance of traditional stories.

It is also worth noting that in both of Ipellie’s illustrations of Nuliajuk, she is given the same characteristics; there are, however, some differences. These differences are likely due to her role in both of these stories. In The Half-Fish, she is more of a sympathetic figure in need of assistance, who then bestows gifts to the people. Ipellie shows her with a tail, webbed hands and a braid. In “Summit with Sedna,” she is portrayed as the antagonist, as a villain who must be appeased. The accompanying illustration depicts Sedna with more grotesque facial features, her breasts prominent, webbed hands with eyes on them. In both drawings, Sedna is given braids, indicating that she has had her hair combed (one of the roles of the shaman is to make a journey to the bottom of the sea to comb and braid her hair), and thus has been placated.  

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Representations of Nuliajuk, or Sedna, vary greatly between having the appearance of a sea mammal or that of a mermaid. While some Inuit artists may agree that she is something like a mermaid, others disagree, noting that the figure of the mermaid might have been imported by European mythologies. Instead, they emphasize her role as a creator, as spirit. Either way, her depictions are marked by transformation; in all iterations, her fingers, once chopped off, become sea mammals, and she is often seen with fins or a tail. In Inuit cosmologies, the ability to transform is evidence of the non-rigidity of categories of human/animal, or natural/supernatural (Florence 34-5): “Thus the sea beings represent a timeless and non-social world where the distinction between human beings and animal has collapsed” (Oosten 492).  

Post author: Marie-Anne Redhead

Sources:

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

Florence, Kathryn. Tail/Tale/Tell: The Transformations of Sedna into an Icon of Survivance in the Visual Arts Through the Eyes of Four Contemporary Urban Inuit Artists. 2019. Concordia University, Masters thesis.

Gedalof, Robyn and Alootook Ipellie. Paper Stays Put: A Collection of Inuit Writing. Hurtig, 1980.

Irniq, Peter. “The Story of Nuliajuk.” Canadian Museum of History website (The Canadian History Hall, Origins). Accessed 1 April 2020.

McCall, Sophie, et al., editors. Read, Listen, Tell: Indigenous Stories from Turtle Island. Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2017.

Oosten, Jarich, and Laugrand Frédéric. “Representing the ‘Sea Woman’.” Religion and the Arts, vol. 13, no. 4, 2009, pp. 477–495.

Further reading:

Nuliajuk’s Story, Winnipeg Art Gallery.

“The Legend of Nuliajuk (Audio Only, English).” Youtube, uploaded by Taqqut Productions, 11 March 2016.

First image: Alootook Ipellie, Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border, partial installation view. Photo: Karen Asher. Artworks in image, left to right, top to bottom (all by Alootook Ipellie and all ink on paper illustrations published in Paper Stays Put: A Collection of Inuit Writing): Survival in the South by Minnie Aodla Freeman (1980), collection of Annalise and Kur Biedermann, Thayngen, Switzerland; The Half-Fish by Taivitialuk Alaasuaq, collection of E. Gedalof and S. Davies; So You Want to Kill an Eskimo by Anthony Apakark Thrasher, collection of Lynn Jamieson and the late Geoffrey S. Lester; I Make My Living by Carving by Marius Kavotak, collection of Marjorie and Michael P. Kennedy, Vanscoy, Saskatchewan; Ululigarqnaarq by an anonymous author, collection of E. Gedalof and S. Davies.

Second image: Alootook Ipellie, Illustration for The Half-Fish by Taivitialuk Alaasuaq, published in Paper Stays Put: A Collection of Inuit Writing (1980), ink on paper, collection of E. Gedalof and S. Davies; Photo by Justin Wonnacott, courtesy of Carleton University Art Gallery.

Third image: Alootook Ipellie, Illustration for Summit with Sedna, Mother of Sea Beasts, published in Arctic Dreams and Nightmares (1993), ink on paper; Photo from "Alootook Ipellie: Artist, Writer, Dreamer!", April 11, 2013, Zócalo Poets. Accessed April 3, 2020.

Building Nunavut

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Earlier this week, Magnolia Valles Duran contextualized two of Alootook Ipellie’s political cartoons which opposed the construction of pipelines in the North and advocated for an Inuit land claim agreement. Indeed, the issues of industrial encroachment and Inuit land rights are inextricably linked. Today, we will consider a handful of graphic designs Ipellie produced for Inuit organizations who lobbied for the establishment of Nunavut, the largest Indigenous land claim settlement in Canada.

The curators of the touring exhibition Alootook Ipellie: Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border provide excellent background:   

In the decades leading up to the creation of Nunavut in 1999, Alootook Ipellie worked for Inuit political organizations including Inuit Tapirisat of Canada, the Inuit Circumpolar Conference and the Tungavik Federation of Nunavut. He was a passionate believer in and advocate for what he called the “Nunavut dream.” These posters document key moments in Nunavut’s history. Ipellie’s 1982 poster, published by the ITC, encouraged voting in the territory-wide plebiscite that tested public support for the division of the Northwest Territories. In 1987 he designed a series of seven posters, published by the Nunavut Constitutional Forum, to raise awareness of an agreement on Nunavut’s geographical boundary. The boundary for division was ultimately approved by plebiscite on May 4, 1992.

The grouping of posters in this photograph includes the original ink drawing for Building Nunavut, enabling viewers to see this piece in two different stages. The drawing allows us to focus solely on Ipellie’s visual imagery and composition. He vertically stacks the profiles of thirteen Inuit along the right side of the image. Each of the faces is a distinct portrait – it’s likely that at least some of the people depicted are political leaders who would have been recognizable to many in the North. But there is diversity here too – we see men and women, young and old, gathered together. And among the faces is the profile of a man with a wispy moustache and goatee who looks a lot like the artist, minus his glasses. Everyone has a part to play in the creation of Nunavut and people need to work together to make it a reality.

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The need for collective contribution to the successful implementation of Nunavut is underscored in the corresponding poster which indicates the broad social, political and economic categories that it will affect. The poster’s text reads: “Building Nunavut Means: Designing Nunavut, Boundaries, Division of Powers, Fiscal Relations, Nunavut Bill of Rights, Structures and Symbols, Language, Culture, Communications, Cultural Property, Communications, Education, Science and Research, Administration of Justice, Land, Resources and Environment, Offshore, Social Policy, Intergovernmental Relations, International Relations, A Capital for Nunavut.”

The other three posters in this grouping reinforce the concept of active engagement and collective effort. One of Ipellie’s clever yet direct designs shows a globe doubling as a ballot box with the slot for the ballot positioned directly on the Northwest Territories. A hand holding a ballot inserts their vote into the slot. All adult Inuit were encouraged to vote for the establishment of Nunavut through the division of the NWT.

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For Nunavut Wants You, Ipellie updates the ubiquitous Uncle Sam poster used to recruit American soldiers for World War I and World War II. In Ipellie’s rendition, Inuit are being called to do their duty to contribute to the fight for their Indigenous rights. 

Finally, the Nuna Vut poster suggests that the realization of the new territory is dependent upon partnership and people standing together. One person in the poster wears a baseball cap and has their arm around the other person. Both people are wearing white t-shirts with black writing in English and Inuktitut. The writing on the t-shirt worn by the person on the left reads “NUNA”, and the writing on the t-shirt worn by the person on the right reads “VUT.” Neither of the two figures shown can make "Nunavut" on their own. 

Alootook Ipellie’s graphic design work, which was widely distributed across Nunavut, was another means for him to share his vision for the political rights and well-being of other Inuit.

Post author: Jennifer Gibson

Sources: 

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

First image: Alootook Ipellie, Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border, partial installation view. Photo: Karen Asher. Artworks in image, left to right, top to bottom (all by Alootook Ipellie): Drawing for Building Nunavut poster (1987), ink on illustration board, Collection of Dennis Patterson, Senator for Nunavut; Building Nunavut (1987), photomechanical reproduction on paper, estate of the artist;Yes / Nunavut (1982), photomechanical reproduction on paper, estate of the artist; Nunavut Wants You (1987), photomechanical reproduction on paper, estate of the artist; Nuna Vut (1987), photomechanical reproduction on paper, estate of the artist.

Second image: detail of Alootook Ipellie: Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border, partial exhibit installation view, showing drawing for Building Nunavut poster (1987). Photo: Karen Asher.  

Third image: Alootook Ipellie, Nunavut Wants You poster (1987), published by the Nunavut Constitutional Forum. Photo: courtesy of Inuit Art Quarterly. 

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.