Qaumajuq, Winnipeg Art Gallery
In March 2023, IHT organized a territorial Heritage Summit in Winnipeg bringing together community members from about 20 Nunavut communities. We held a closing reception at Qaumajuq in the Winnipeg Art Gallery (WAG). For many this was their first opportunity to see artworks from the Nunavut Collection that are being managed by the WAG because there is no facility to house them in Nunavut. The visible vault features hundreds of sculptures organized by community so it was relatively easy for people to see what was made by their family or friends.
The Dew Line
A new exhibit called The Dew Line opened in March 2023 at the Diefenbunker Museum in Carp, Ontario, about 45 minutes’ drive from Ottawa. The unique underground museum was built as a bunker during the Cold War, a place for Diefenbaker and a small crew to go to survive a nuclear war. The exhibit about the Distant Early Warning Line, outlines the impact of the series of radar stations across the arctic, from Alaska through Canada over Greenland to Iceland. Another exhibit at the Diefenbunker focuses on Canada and the Cold War and discusses the High Arctic Relocations.
The Dew Line exhibition, Diefenbunker, March 2023.
Canadian Museum of Nature
Gjoa Haven community members travelled to Ottawa in January 2023 to see the Franklin Collection in storage at Parks Canada’s offices and to see various related exhibitions. The interactive exhibitions at the Canadian Museum of Nature were popular. Some archaeological objects are so small that they are exhibited with a magnifying glass.
The Canadian History Hall
NIHC Steering Committee members went to Gatineau/Ottawa in December 2022 to visit exhibitions to get ideas for the NIHC and to see the Nunavut Collection in storage at the Canadian Museum of Nature and Parks Canada. The Arctic Bay Thule man exhibit at the Canadian Museum of History was created with the help of the community.
NIHC Steering Committee members enjoyed the maps on the gallery floor and the exhibit of the Arctic Bay Thule man, December 2022.
Our Land, Our Art
A new temporary exhibition titled Our Land, Our Art at the Canadian Museum of Nature runs until October 14, 2024. Avatak and CMN invited artists from Nunavik to create work inspired by historical objects in the Avatak collection. The exhibit is a changing part of the permanent Arctic Gallery that opened in 2017.
NIHC Steering Committee members William Beveridge and Tim Brown took a break to go ice fishing while enjoying the northern galleries, December 2022.
ᑐᓴᕐᓂᑐᑦ TUSARNITUT! Music Born of the Cold
The NIHC Director of Planning was fortunate to have a preview of the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal’s exhibition ᑐᓴᕐᓂᑐᑦ TUSARNITUT! Music Born of the Cold led by Curatorial Assistant Charissa von Harringa Laurence-Amélie De Coste, the Assistant Head of Exhibition Administration days before it opened in November 2023. The exhibition was curated by Jean-Jacques Nattiez, ethnomusicologist and Professor Emeritus at Université de Montréal, and Lisa Qiluqqi Koperqualuk, previous Curator and Mediator of Inuit Art, MMFA (now president of Inuit Circumpolar Council Canada). It’s a beautiful exhibition that focuses on Inuit drumming and throat singing, both visually and through audio. The exhibition is now travelling and opened at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto on May 23, 2023.
The installation at the Musée des Beaux Arts, November 2022.
Arctic Journeys
In September 2023, the Telus World of Science in Edmonton opened a new exhibition called Arctic Journeys. The exhibition has a scientific, rather than a cultural focus, but it includes a couple of things that might be interesting to see in the NIHC, including a fiberglass igloo that you could walk into and a simulation experience of dog sledding. Piita Irniq made an Inuksuit for the exhibition.
The NIHC Director of Planning tested the immersive experiences in the Arctic Journeys exhibition.
ᐊᖏᕐᕋᒧᑦ / Ruovttu Guvlui / Towards Home
The Canadian Centre for Architecture recently organized an exhibition about the concept of home for Indigenous people. The exhibition, which closed at the end of February 2023, was a collaborative curatorial project that included the work of NIHC juror Nicole Luke and a video installation Inissaliortut / Making Room, by Inuit artists Laakkuluk Williamson Bathory and Tagralik Partridge. The exhibition explored Inuit, First Nations, Métis, and Sámi concepts of home, land and architecture and challenged colonial prescriptions.
Installation of Towards Home at the CCA, January 2023.