Aedan Uviluq Corey
Art lives inside of Aedan Uviluq Corey. Art that is synergistic, moving and at the same time gentle, resilient and ever enduring.
The ar t of stor y telling came early to Uviluq. At the age of two they created a song that moved their parents to tears. As an older child they turned to writing shor t stories that later coalesced into poetry, which they continue to this day, as well as digital illustration.
As with many Inuit of a certain age, Uviluq was not born in Nunavut but down south, in Edmonton, AB. They grew up in Iqaluktuuttiaq (Cambridge Bay), NU, spent summers with their grandparents living the traditional life and, as a child, spoke Nat tilingmiutut and Qikiqtaaluup nigiani almost exclusively. This has given them a sense of grounding that, coupled with their own innate sense of art, blossomed into something that made them whole.
Uviluq makes ar t for the soul by tattooing traditional lines called kakiniit (body tattoos—excluding the face) and tunniit (exclusively face tattoos). They had their first kakiniit completed in 2016 through the Inuit Tat too Revitalization Project in their home community. From that point, Uviluq unquestionably wanted to bestow kakiniit and tunniit to fellow Inuit. As they received their tunniit by Zorga Qaunaq in 2020, Uviluq was taught how to create and render traditional tat toos.
To Uviluq, tattooing is an act of defiance and rebellion against the colonial system. Each piece they complete is a gift of bodily sovereignty, confidence and reclamation. “My tattooing is returning home to myself,” says Uviluq. They applied their own tunniit, and when they finished, Uviluq explains, “It felt like it was supposed to be there.”
Uviluq says, “Tattooing takes a lot of emotion out of you because it’s emotional work.” However, they don’t feel that this emotional work is something to capitalize on, so instead Uviluq
uses a bar tering system. The recipient gifts Uviluq something— sometimes it’s country food, sometimes it’s a pair of earrings— according to the weight and importance of the work and the impact it has on the person.
Inter twined with their tattoo practice is their love of poetry, as both art forms come from the heart. Poetry allows them to sit within a moment and experience the feelings of it. Uviluq elaborates that they “have to be emotional and feel okay about that.”
Their book, Inuujunga: I Am Alive (2020), is a treatise of wonderment and hard truths—steady, observant and fraught with emotion. It is truly a book to keep and reread. They are now working on their second poetry collection of 60 poems entitled
Kinaavit: Who Are You? As Uviluq explores who they are as a tattoo ar tist, poet and graphic ar tist, they continue to reveal and express different aspects of themself.
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Kavelina Torres is a Yup'ik and Inupiaq Inuk from Alaska. Their writing speaks to Indigenous futurisms, snow and female body protagonists, nor thern Indigenous Peoples in science fiction, horror and daily life. Torres is published in fiction and has directed and written in film and theatre. They teach scripting, directing and previsualization and preproduction for filmmaking and theatre. Torres graduated from the University of Alaska Fairbanks with a BA in Indigenous Filmmaking and from the University of British Columbia with an
MFA in Creative Writing.
This Profile was made possible through suppor t from the RBC Emerging Ar tists Project.