Drawn from poverty: Art hasn’t saved Canada’s Inuit
Hours before flying off to her debut show in Toronto, Ooloosie Saila, a rising star in the Canadian art world, was hiding in her grandmother’s room on the frozen edge of the Arctic Ocean, cowering in fear.
Between her and the future stood the man in the next room, a relative who was drunk and raging — again. She perched on the bed, terrified he would burst in. Then, she packed in a frenzy.
She threw the hand-sewn outfit she had chosen for the opening into a plastic garbage bag, pulled her two young sons out of bed, grabbed her art supplies and fled into the frigid night.
Four days and 1,425 miles found Saila at the Feheley Fine Arts gallery in Toronto, where the crowd sipped wine and gushed over her “bold use” of color and negative space.
“It’s an incredible way of depicting the landscape,” said Stefan Hancherow, the associate art curator for the country’s biggest bank. “The paper becomes a stand-in for minimalism but it’s maximal in that it’s depicting snow and ice.”
He asked Saila, who is 28, what had given her the idea. “I just did it myself,” she replied.
It is a golden moment for the indigenous people of Canada. At least, in theory. The country is going through a period of atonement for its history of racism. While much of the world has turned inward, becoming more xenophobic, Canada has been consumed with making amends.
Public meetings across the country routinely start with an acknowledgment that they are standing on traditional indigenous lands. Buildings have been renamed, street signs changed and in one city, a statue of the country’s first prime minister was removed.
Canadians call this “reconciliation,” and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who faces a tight reelection vote on Monday, has made it central to his government and image.
In Ooloosie Saila, many might see the embodiment of these aspirations: an accomplished artist being feted for her depictions of the Inuit landscape in brilliant pinks and oranges — a young indigenous woman who is making it.
But the world she returned to after the opening, the hamlet of Cape Dorset, is plagued by poverty, alcoholism and domestic abuse. The possibility of brutality is never far away. The relative raging in Saila’s house on the eve of her trip has assaulted her repeatedly, and has gone to jail for it. “I’m not afraid of him when he’s sober,” she said.
Cape Dorset — a community of about 1,400 on a bay cradled by low-lying, bald mountains — is synonymous in Canadian minds with art. Local artists churn out works that decorate the walls of corporate headquarters and the homes of the well-off. Cape Dorset prints are featured on Canadian stamps and currency. Its sculptures are the standard gift of Canadian diplomats.
If any town could slip the bonds of poverty that have defined indigenous life in Canada for so long, it should be Cape Dorset. Instead, it reflects the vast disconnect between the country’s aspirations and the grim reality on the ground.
Almost 90 percent of its residents live in public housing that is crowded, run-down, and has a three-year waiting list. Suicide is rife: The stony graveyard is dotted with crosses marking young people. More than half the residents rely on public assistance.
Artists like Saila may do a little better, but the vast majority eke out a living, often below the poverty line. Many support large extended families that depend on them for food — most of it flown in at exorbitant cost so that a single cucumber goes for $4.50. And as for “reconciliation?” Saila has never heard of it.
Her goals are much more practical. She needs to make enough money to feed her two children. And she dreams of buying a snowmobile so she can return to the landscapes of her drawings. The Inuit of Cape Dorset were once the epitome of self-reliance, members of a hunting culture where everyone had a role. They lived entirely off the frozen land, searching for food by dog sled. Then government workers lured them into the town, built around a trading post in the 1950s, with promises of permanent housing and school. In some cases, they shot their dogs, stranding them. Officials soon took note of the Inuits’ artistic skills, and thought that they might offer a bridge to a stationary existence, a way to make a living. Art has been a central feature of Cape Dorset life since then.
In 1959, artists created a co-op with an Inuit-led board that oversaw sales and plowed profits into the creation of a general store. In the center of town is a symbol of the co-op’s success: a new, modern $9.8 million cultural center with spacious art studios and the hamlet’s first gallery space. The town has other bright spots, including a $240-a-night hotel and a new health center under construction.
By one government estimate, most artists across the territory make only about $2,080 a year. Once discovered, the stars are paid more. A handful of artists top $75,000 a year. This winter, news broke that one artist, Shuvinai Ashoona, had been awarded a $38,000 prize. But they are the rare exceptions.