Themes of motherhood and mentorship are front and centre in Nanaimo Art Gallery’s latest exhibit.
“Intergenerational relationships are definitely fundamental – and not just in this exhibition – but in Inuit relationships. Obviously colonization really impacted on that,” said Roxane Shaughnessy, the senior curator and manager of collection with the Textile Museum of Canada.
The exhibit, Double Vision, presents the works of three Inuit artists from Nunavut, Jessie Oonark and two of her daughters. The show spotlights an art form using multicoloured cut-felt forms, often with embroidery, to create scenes showing relationships between people and animals.
While working in Kinngait (also known as Cape Dorset, Nvt.), Shaughnessy said she has witnessed how crucial mentorships are. And not strictly intergenerationally either, but laterally between artists and colleagues.
Double Vision was originally developed by the Textile Museum of Canada for the 2022 Toronto Biennial of Art, as curated by Candice Hopkins while she was senior curator for the city-wide exhibit that year. It was on display at the museum from March 2022 until April 2023. Shaughnessy worked closely with Hopkins for the exhibit.
Oonark was one of the most well-known artists from Qamani`tuaq (also known as Baker Lake, Nvt.) who created wall hangings and prints and who had a huge influence on practices in the region. Along with her daughters, Shaughnessy said the three of them created the core work that came out of the community. The name of the show was derived from Oonark’s work.
“Jessie’s practice involved symmetry. And, her work is often seeing through this duality. She saw the world as two halves, not exactly symmetrical, which is interesting,” Shaughnessy said, adding one of the key pieces in the show, called Double Igloo, is a manifestation of her vision.
According to Shaughnessy, the textile artist only began working with wool at the age of 59, after she moved to Qamani`tuaq and had 13 children – eight of whom became artists.
“The survival of a family in a harsh northern climate in the arctic depended on having expertly sewn and crafted clothing. And Inuit women practised a vibrant tradition in making the clothing using a graphic approach,” the curator said.
Oonark focused on representation of women, as well as the tools of women. A common depiction in her art is the ulu – a round-edged knife, referred to as a women’s knife, traditionally used as an all-purpose tool by Inuit women.
In one of the works by Victoria Mamnguqsualuk, the younger of Oonark’s daughters to follow in her footsteps, shows the importance of intergenerational relationships between the artists.
“Victoria was also very interested in relationships with people and animals,” Shaughnessy said. “And this was partly the result of how as a child she listened to stories from her grandmother late in the night, and really absorbed the Inuit oral history from her.”
Janet Kigusiuq, Oonark’s elder daughter of the two, was introduced to paper collage later in her art career and started the medium because of her arthritis.
“Her use of colour and pattern … She really worked an effort to represent the land and life around her … She’s inspired by what she called the in-between time at dusk, the way that shifting light can bring different characteristics to the landscape."
The Nanaimo Art Gallery Double Vision exhibit will be the second showing in B.C. and the second this year, the first having been held in January at the Kamloops Art Gallery. It will be displayed until Sept. 15.
