Where the artist Chih-Chien Wang saw a round head of green cabbage, the young Inuit Iliana Beaulne saw a volleyball stained with diesel.
Placed side by side, these two works are part of the exhibition Tarratuutiq | Taima. Artistic and climatic reflections in Nunavik, which unites young people from Puvirnituq secondary school to the National Museum of Fine Arts of Quebec. In Inuktitut, “ tarratuutiq ” And “ taima ” mean “mirror” and “enough”.
Initially, the idea was to circulate the museum’s collection to the borders of Quebec. “We wanted the collection to be accessible to all Quebecers, so we wanted to reach more remote regions, particularly indigenous communities,” says Sophie Lessard-Latendresse, head of art and wellness mediation at the MNBAQ. It was she and Justine Boulanger, responsible for digital educational content, who established the first contacts with the Kativik school board.
There, more than 1000 kilometers from Quebec, an arts teacher, Nathalie Claude, who has lived in Nunavik for two years, answered the call. It is his students who, each in their own way, created works that echo those of the museum.
Amid reflections on the opposition between tradition and modernity, on community ties and on the territory, it is the latter which ultimately took on the most importance. With this theme came that of climate change and pollution.
At the center of the young people’s concerns was the dump, says their teacher Nathalie Claude. It’s a huge, dirty, invasive space, where we burn waste because we have nowhere to put it, where we sometimes find the best and the worst. And which is often seen as a source of distraction when the youth center is closed, because there is “a glaring lack of activities for young people in the village”.
“Young Inuit people have to endure so much that, for them, everything is normal, everything seems normal,” continues the teacher.
Do everything with nothing
The dump is also where the young people found many costumes, objects and even landscapes. In a video which accompanies the exhibition and which is ironically entitled The Beach, a student plays the cello perched on a school bus wreck. This is because the boat that brings food to Nunavik every six months never leaves with the waste, explains Justine Bouchard. And it is the only region of Quebec that has the right to dispose of them by burning them.
In an interview, Connie Ittukallak, a 17-year-old Inuit participant in the exhibition, says she found beauty in the objects from the Puvirnituq community dump. “They are old and rusty. But I especially like the tires,” she notes. Two years ago, young people used it to create a playground; They painted them for summer camp, she explains.
“Young people are always capable of creating with nothing, and that’s what’s fascinating. If you look at all these creations, there is no budget in this project: everything was done with recycled materials,” remarks Nathalie Claude.
When waste burns, it smells very strong; also, one of the photos taken by the group shows them protected with a gas mask. Velesie Adams, who designed the graphic creations for the exhibition, also represented a polar bear with a gas mask. In an interview, the 18-year-old young woman says that she observes polar bears “several times a year” in her community of Ivujivik, in the far north of Nunavik, but she knows that they have less and less ice floes. to circulate.
Inspired by topographical work Taiga by René Derouin, Inuit students cut out a map of Nunavik from raccoon skin. The location of each village is marked by empty Sun-Maid raisin boxes.
“It’s very difficult to get fresh fruits and vegetables in the North. So, these are these boxes of grapes that we give to students as fruit in the morning and for snacks. There are many young people who don’t like raisins. The boxes end up on the ground and become polluting objects,” explains Sophie Lessard-Latendresse. And “on the boxes of grapes, there is also the image of the white woman, which represents the presence, in fact, of the white man in Nunavik. So, in each work there are a bit of all these layers,” she continues.
Communicate through art
In a context where education is entirely in Inuktitut until the third year of elementary school and then transitions to a second language — English or French, your choice — art becomes a powerful means of communication. Connie Ittukallak and Velesie Adams are both educated in French, although the interview is in English and they speak Inuktitut at home.
On Wednesday, they will be at the MNBAQ to meet the public about Tarratuutiq | Taima.
Next year, they will have to move to the South to continue their studies, since there are no post-secondary establishments in Nunavik. “We’re definitely going to get bored of hunting,” Connie already confides.
In an interview, the latter notes that the perception of art can differ between the North and the South. “We know what is beautiful, and what makes us feel good, especially in nature. » The effects of climate change, moreover, are omnipresent. “We feel that the seasons change in some way. It’s more humid. The cold arrives later in the North Bay. […] I don’t know how we will adapt. We are so modernized now. »
“In Ivujivik, there is less snow. This is especially observed in the months of December and January, which are traditionally the coldest,” continues Velesie.