Herb Mathisen
Northern News Services
Published Monday, July 21, 2008

PANNIQTUUQ/PANGNIRTUNG - Gabriel Bourassa knows that printmaking is a meticulous craft that takes time.

"Right now, I'm working on one and it's taken about a week and a half, or two weeks," said Bourassa, who completed two prints for the Uqqurmiut Centre for Arts and Crafts' 2008 Pangnirtung community print collection.

"I'm only three quarters of the way through this one I'm working on."

Five printmakers at the centre in Pangnirtung worked last year to produce the 13 prints that make up the 2008 print collection.

The prints will be on display in galleries across North America. Bourassa said he knew of prints being shipped to Yellowknife, Ottawa, Toronto and as far away as San Francisco.

Bourassa grew up in Pangnirtung, and left to attend school in Yellowknife. He moved back to Pangnirtung in 1998 and has been there ever since.

A lot goes into producing the prints.

Three different methods were used to produce the prints: etching, stencilling and linoleum.

Artists like Andrew Qappik, used stencilling and etching methods to create their prints. Qappik has four prints in the catalogue.

Bourassa used the linoleum method.

With the linoleum technique, an image is traced onto tracing paper, and is transferred onto a big piece of rubber, about a half-inch thick.

"We roll the paper off, and then the image goes onto the paper backwards," he said. "Then we cut out what we need to cut out."

On the piece of rubber, he said, the dark parts of the print remain untouched, while the parts of the image that remain blank are cut away, much in the way one would think of a rubber stamp.

The paintings and drawings that are picked are at the discretion of the printmakers, said Bourassa.

"When the printmakers make their prints, they choose form a variety of drawings that we keep up in the print shop," he said.

"They go through the pictures and choose the drawings that they wish."

One of the drawings Bourassa chose to print, he did himself. It is called Inuit Montage.

The drawing incorporates many traditional elements involved in the seal hunt, with the frame composed of weapons that are used to kill seals.

"There is a hunter's face in the opening of the door," said Bourassa. "The ice that the iglu is on, I have the opening part for a seal hole and it's right in the middle of the door too, so there is a seal going through the hole."

"It symbolizes where the food goes," said Bourassa. "It always ends up at home where the people share it."

The centre has prints dating back to 1994 for sale on their website right now.

There was a fire at the print shop in 1994.

"The (prints) from 1970 to 1993 have been kept here as old historic prints, kind of like an old museum," he said.

"We preserve those just for history."

Bourassa said he enjoys hearing feedback and comments about his work from people who appreciate the prints and is proud to do his part to showcase Inuit art to the world.

"It's nice to be able to do something like this and to show other people around the world what we can do," he said.

"It's a good feeling when someone says something nice about your drawing."