Our First Wooden Home

Inuit of Northern Canada

    The most northerly regions of the Canadian Arctic are the ancestral homes of distinct peoples known as Inuit,1 a plural term meaning 'the people.' In this harsh forbidding environment, where there are at least sixteen terms for snow the ancestors of today's many-thousand Inuit2 lived in small semi-nomadic family groups. These ancient people, referred to by archeologists and anthropologists as the Thule culture, migrated eastward between 1000 and 1300 AD from Alaska into what is now the Canadian Arctic.3 These whale hunting people were the originators of the marvelous technologies conducive to life in the Arctic such as snow houses, dog teams and sleds, harpoons and whale floats, umiaks and kayaks. The land and sea provided everything they needed from food and clothing, to fuel and shelter.

Inuit of northern Canada are direct descendants of these early inhabitants. However, Inuit no longer derive a living from the land in the same manner as their ancestors once did. Contemporary Inuit live in communities in heated wooden homes with many modern conveniences. Most of the goods required by families are purchased from local stores stocked with inventory shipped in from southern Canada. Hunting and fishing helps to offset the costs of imported foods. But for most Inuit, hunting and fishing, on the land of their ancestors, are recreational activities rather than means of sustenance.

How Inuit Came to Live in Communities

Having little contact except with the most hardy of explorers, whalers and fur traders, Inuit for a long time were largely isolated from the rest of the world.4 They were relatively unknown to the average Canadian, let alone other nations, until the 1940s.

It was activities of the United States and Canadian governments, spurred by the impending World War II and the following cold war, that brought the world's attention to what seemed to be an exotic, pristine aboriginal culture practicing their traditional lifestyle minus the trappings and the complexities of modern societies.

In the 1950s, Canada and the United States jointly ventured to establish airfields, weather stations and military surveillance posts across the Arctic.5 In doing so, they inadvertently opened northern Canada. These ventures provided jobs for skilled technicians from the south and for Inuit in the north, abruptly bringing two cultures together. People in southern Canada suddenly became aware of Inuit in northern Canada.

As news of these newly 'discovered' peoples spread, Canadians learned that Inuit were once a healthy self sufficient people, but that now sickness and starvation were seriously impacting their lives. These problems were the aftermath of diseases carried into the north by European whalers, explorers looking for a Northwest Passage, fur traders, missionaries, scientists and later visitors as well as the economic implications of the failing fur trade of the late 1930s.6

At first, the fur trade had been a lucrative business for Europeans and Inuit. Inuit were pleased to be able to acquire goods from Europe and southern Canada by trading furs at the Hudson Bay posts. The problem was that participating in the fur trade contributed to modifications in Inuit lifestyles and to their eventual dependence on outside foodstuff, fabrics, rifles and ammunition. When the world demand for furs declined, Inuit lost their ability to continue these trade relations. They could no longer afford the goods they needed. Their situation was further complicated in that many Inuit, in order to trap the furs of inland animals, had moved far away from their coastal homes where seal and fish were plentiful.7 Now they were living in the interior regions where the wildlife population had sharply declined and at a time when the migratory patterns of some animals, particularly the caribou of the Keewatin, had shifted. As the overall health of Inuit deteriorated, primarily due to lack of sufficient food, tuberculosis ravaged the north.

Canadians had seen the severe effects of colonization on other aboriginal peoples in the rest of Canada and supported their government in taking steps to help Inuit. The Canadian Government began to provide goods and services to Inuit beginning with food and health care. But serving people who lived in small, scattered, semi-permanent settlements over the large expansive territory was problematic. The solution was to establish communities and dispense services from these locations in hopes that Inuit would relocate their families and take up permanent residence. With the goal of encouraging Inuit to settle in communities, the government began to build wooden homes, health centers and schools where trading posts had been located. Recognizing that Inuit would need to exist in a money economy, the federal government began to investigate and implement job creation programs. Baby bonuses, which had already been a program in the south, began to be paid to Inuit families. For those Inuit without jobs welfare money was available.

By the later part of the 1960s, most Inuit families had moved from the land into communities, and become permanently established as their children began to attend school. Today there are about 66 Inuit communities scattered over the whole of the northern territories including Arctic Quebec and Labrador.8 Twenty-eight of these communities are located in the new territory, Nunavut. The population of communities varies. Some have as few as 18 residents, while Iqaluit, the capital of Nunavut, numbers 4,556 according to April 1, 1999 figures.9 An average population of 500 is a large community by northern standards.

A New Canadian Art Form is Born

The relocation of Inuit families from the land into communities, throughout the 1950s and 1960s, was an important catalyst in stimulating the Inuit art movement and is pertinent to understanding the history of Inuit art. On the surface it seemed like a good idea when the Canadian government began to move Inuit families into communities. But living in communities poses a serious problem. It takes money to live in them.

James Houston is probably the most well known name when it comes to Inuit art circles. Michael Rice of San Francisco's Albers Gallery is quoted in the Toronto Globe and Mail as stating, "No James Houston, no Inuit art."10 Rice may well be correct.

Shortly after his return home from serving his country in the Second World War, Houston, a young and romantic artist, was lured to the north in search of subject matter. There he encountered numerous adventures. But more importantly, he found the little known inhabitants of the Canadian Arctic to be incredibly artistic and prone to carving images from soapstone and other indigenous materials.

On his first visit to Arctic Quebec, Houston entertained his new acquaintances by drawing their likeness in his sketchbook. Presumably in exchange for the pleasure they derived from his sketches, the Inuit he encountered gifted to him small realistic carvings of animals.

When Houston shared his discovery with the Canadian Guild of Crafts there was great excitement. This organization was devoted to the preservation of Canadian Native Indian artistic expressions and the promotion of Indian arts and crafts, as a way of preserving Indian culture and providing Indians with a way to earn an income.11 Previously, they had had some involvement with the promotion of Inuit handicrafts, but the sculptural forms were fairly new to them. It wasn't long before they turned all of their attention and efforts towards the development of Inuit arts and crafts.

The Guild made arrangements for Houston to return to the north. He was to purchase and collect carvings, exchanging them for tokens. Arrangements had been made for Inuit carvers to exchange the tokens at any Hudson Bay post for goods of a certain value. The approximate three hundred carvings, in ivory and stone, collected by Houston were exhibited by the Guild. The exhibition and sale, held November 21, 1949, was an incredible success. About 90 percent of the works sold in three days.12 The Canadian government, seeing the potential of Inuit arts and crafts in augmenting the incomes of Inuit families and reducing their dependence on government funds, involved themselves in stimulating the production and promotion of Inuit arts and crafts. From these auspicious beginnings, Inuit art was launched and a new form of Canadian fine art was popularized.

Since that initial showing, the market for Inuit art has continued to expand. Commercial galleries dealing in Inuit sculpture and prints dot the globe, with the market in Germany being exceptionally strong. Significant museums and galleries in Canada, the United States and Western Europe hold important works representative of the Inuit art movement in their collections. Several individual Inuit artists have been recognized with solo exhibitions, honours and awards.

At the time, the Canadian Craft Guild could never have imagined the far-reaching effects their philanthropic activities would have. From a motivation to assist first peoples towards achieving economic and cultural stability a full-fledged movement of Inuit art and craft was born.

Samantha Archibald

1 The Algonquin Indians gave the term Eskimo meaning "eaters of raw meat" to these people. It has been replaced in favor of Inuit, their name for themselves.

2 Dane Lanken and Mary Vincent report that the population of Nunavut is 27,219. Eighty-five percent of these people are Inuit. See "Nunavut" Canadian Geographic (January/February 1999): 39.

3 George Swinton, Sculpture of the Eskimo (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1972), 111.

4 The transition from Thule culture to what is loosely termed the Historic period begins with the coming of the whiteman. Ibid., 112.

5 Author not identified, The Inuit (Ottawa: Published under the authority of the Hon. Bill McKnight, P.C., M.P., Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, 1986), 25.

6 Ibid., 22-23.

7 Ibid., 23.

8 Ibid., 50.

9 Back side of map, Canadian Geographic (January/February 1999): inserted between pages 46 & 47.

10 James Houston, Confessions of an Igloo Dweller (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1995) back cover.

11 Tom Hill, "Indian Art in Canada: An Historical Perspective" in Elizabeth McLuhan, Norval Morrisseau and the emergence of the image makers (Toronto: Art Gallery of Ontario, c1984), 16.

12 Ingo Hessel. Inuit Art (Vancouver/Toronto: Douglas & McIntyre, 1998), 29.