SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - Artists are organizing in the Sahtu.

Visual artists, musicians, craftspeople and storytellers from the region are beginning to network to raise awareness about their work while building their skills to develop careers from their art.

Stephen Kakfwi shared stories and songs during the Sahtu in the Arts show in Yellowknife last month. Artists from around the region gathered in the capital to perform, showcase and market their art. A Sahtu Arts Association is in the works to continue the momentum. - Daron Letts/NNSL photo Artists featured during the Sahtu in the Arts show in Yellowknife June 26 and 27: Thomas Manuel, fiddler from Radilih Koe/Fort Good Hope and guitar player George Mandeville Stephen Kakfwi,singer/songwriter, Radilih Koe/Fort Good Hope Leon Andrew, head drummer, Tulita Dene Drummers Maurice Mendo, elder and drummer, Tulita Ricky Andrew, drummer and artist, Tulita Shirley Bernard, traditional fine arts, Tulita Janet Grandjambe, traditional fine arts, Radilih Koe/Fort Good Hope Peter John Lafferty, artist, Radilih Koe/Fort Good Hope Cassia Shae, artist, Radilih Koe/Fort Good Hope Stella Mackienzo, traditional fine arts, Deline Margaret Sewi, traditional fine arts, Deline Bobby Dean Manuel, artist, Colville Lake Linda Manuel, traditional fine arts, Colville Lake

Earlier this year, the regional office for the GNWT Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment (ITI) in Norman Wells initiated a program called Sahtu in the Arts. The program launched with a series of workshops in May and June in Fort Good Hope, Deline, Colville Lake, Norman Wells and Tulita.

The workshops encouraged artists to identify themselves as artists and introduced marketing strategies, grant writing, education opportunities, avenues for acquiring art supplies in remote communities, copyright information and business practices that artists need to make a living from their work.

Late last month ITI collaborated with the Norman Wells Land Claimant Corp., which hosted a dozen artists from around the region for the two-day Sahtu in the Arts show in Yellowknife.

In recent weeks, follow-up workshops returned to the communities. The last information workshop is scheduled for July 23 to 25 in Fort Good Hope.

"We are also talking about planning a Sahtu Artists Association," said ITI Fine and Traditional Arts Development Officer Antoine Mountain. "The association would do the same thing we're doing with Sahtu in the Arts, promoting the arts in the Sahtu."

The association would continue to link artists in the Sahtu. However, the artists themselves would undertake the organizing, Mountain said.

Groups such as ITI and other funding bodies could then be brought on board to support for the association.

Some communities have a head start on that project.

"In Tulita, the artists are trying to come together to have an artists association," said economic development officer Sam Fagbemiro.

"Other communities are trying to have their own associations. Then, they can come together under one umbrella called the Sahtu Artists Association.

"This will be a venue for promoting the art of the people. Instead of doing it on an individual basis they would be able to do it as a Sahtu-wide association, so people out there, not only in Canada but outside Canada, would be in a position to know what is happening in the Sahtu."

An association is necessary to properly market the region and its artists, he continued.

"We need to keep on encouraging the artists because some of them feel that they are forgotten and that people don't actually appreciate what they are doing. So we have to encourage them and let them know that people out there appreciate what they are doing and that people are interested in what they are doing."

Organizers with the Sahtu in the Arts program are preparing to feature artwork from the region July 2009 as part of the cultural program for the 14th Triannual International Congress on Circumpolar Health in Yellowknife.