Michele LeTourneau
Northern News Services

NNSL (Feb 01/99) - The 50th anniversary of Inuit art came and went in 1998. Marking Nunavut, museums and art galleries everywhere are featuring major retrospective exhibits of Inuit art, whether it be carvings, graphic arts or textile arts.

As was the case in the earliest days, demands from the southern market play an integral role in the shaping of Northern art.

James Houston, often credited for having brought Inuit art to the south back in 1948, explains why it became so popular in the first place.

"I think it's because it's something real. Most people are buying one-of-a- kind originals. Now that's a really rare thing to have.

All of a sudden a great art form appeared right before our eyes, not one of us, certainly including me, had known existed."

Peter Lau, based in Yellowknife, has been involved with Inuit artists since the '70s. He explains that the majority of people who buy carvings continue to want simple pieces that depict animals of the North, such as polar bears. For those buyers, such a carving stands as a symbol for the Far North.

Yet, carvers such as Charles Ugyuk and Judas Ullulaq began -- in the '70s -- carving traditional narratives, resulting in original, highly- complex works of art. They've clearly whet the appetite of collectors because according to Darlene Wight, associate curator of Inuit art at the Winnipeg Art Gallery, a gallery that has in excess of 10,000 pieces of Inuit art, carvings, graphics and textiles -- there is actually a shortage of what she calls "good" pieces.

"There is not really enough supply to meet the demand for quality carving," says Wight. "So much of it is geared for gift shops. In terms of the very fine carvings, there are not enough."

As carvers honed a skill into an art, the art consumers have developed their tastes.

Wight attributes the lack of quality carvings to the fact that fewer and fewer people are choosing to become carvers.

"Those that do choose to become carvers have a new awareness, they see themselves as artists."

Lau and Houston also both voiced the opinion that the great difference in Inuit art then and now is largely a difference in the creators themselves.

Northerners such as Inuvialuit painter and carver Bill Nasogaluak, and Inuit filmmaker Zacharias Kunuk, want to be considered artists first and foremost, as they certainly consider themselves to be.

Though there is an estimated 1,500 to 2,000 carvers in the North, specific artists are setting themselves apart from the crowd like never before because of the work they do.

"There are some young people coming along -- like Ovilu Tunnillie -- I think she's a simply marvellous, unbelievable artist. So I suppose it'll come down to artists," says Houston.

Northern artists are depending less on the whims of southern fancy, turning firmly toward their own artistic impulses.

"Art has largely escaped us in southern Canada. We have very, very few practitioners. The smallest settlement in the Arctic has created more artists than any good-sized town or city in Canada. So we haven't got much to teach them except -- you know -- how to fix an outboard engine or something, if that."

Independence is being achieved in more than one way in the North.