Nick Sikkuark

A retrospective of the late Inuk artist Nick Sikkuark (1943–2013) opened at the National Gallery of Canada (NGC) last November, falling between pivotal events pushing institutions into the spotlight about what is—or what is not—being done regarding decolonization. “Nick Sikkuark: Humour and Horror / ᓂᑯᓚ ᓯ ᑯ ᐊ . ᐃ ᒡ ᓚ ᕐ ᓇ ᖅ ᑐ ᑦ ᐊ ᒻ ᒪ ᑲᑉᐱᐊᓇᖅᑐᑦ” was conceived over a decade prior, at a time when decolonizing was surfacing in institutional speak, years before the 2022 implementation of the Indigenous Ways and Decolonization (IWD) department at the NGC, a decision that has caused much controversy. Reverberations have reached across the border. In October, the New York Times’s “Turmoil Engulfs Canadian Art Museums Seeking to Shed Colonial Past” included statements from previous (Marc Mayer) and new (Jean- François Bélisle) NGC directors. Regarding arts institutions Mayer stated, “Their job is not to either decolonize or to make Canada a less racist place.” The Times noted Bélisle’s avoidance of the word, “a term he described as ‘very loaded.’” In a November interview, “The National Gallery’s Fix-It Guy,” with Canadian journalist Paul Wells, Bélisle commented, “I’m not even sure I’m interested in thinking about it. I’m interested in building something, not de-building it.” Only just stepping into the role in June, he came under fire; a press release followed, addressing the fumble. With the sudden 2022 departure of Sasha Suda, the NGC director responsible for IWD and the strategic plan “Transform Together (2021–2026),” the internal malaise, at least in Ottawa, is perceivable from the outside: staff trying to hold it all together. Into this structural fragility arrived Sikkuark’s exhibition.

At the entrance, a large whalebone sculpture confronts visitors, performing the unpleasant task of nasal flossing (an ancient hygienic practice) alluding to the sentiment of the exhibition title. The work, Untitled (Man with Arms Outstretched), 1987–1988, was included in “Inuit Modern,” the Art Gallery of Ontario’s (AGO) 2011 exhibition co-curated by Gerald McMaster (Cree) and Ingo Hessel. (With the recent departure of Indigenous curators Wanda Nanibush, Anishinaabe, and Taqralik Partridge, Inuk, the AGO has been facing its own reckoning regarding decolonization.) In her catalogue essay, Inuk curator Heather Igloliorte had identified, “There are no Inuit working in our national arts institutions.” Thirteen years later, the cultural landscape is changing. Recent NGC hires by IWD include emerging Inuk curator Jocelyn Piirainen as associate curator, Inuit Art, previously at the Winnipeg Art Gallery with its new dedicated Inuit art space Qaumajuq, although Piirainen is not mentioned as involved in Sikkuark’s retrospective. My memory of “Inuit Modern” is of being absorbed by the power of the works, including Sikkuark’s, and as Igloliorte phrased it, “the Inuit avant-garde [who] have begun this practice of frank self-representation by making art that responds to, and provides commentary on, the many entangled impacts of almost a century of colonial influence in the Arctic.” The work had the conditions to exude potency, an exhilarating environment in which to encounter voices of an emergent decolonial vanguard.

At the NGC, Sikkuark’s works are presented in a standard sequential fashion from his earliest (illustrations for children’s books) and ending with experimental drawings produced closer to his death. In the cavernous space after the entrance, the book pages are projected beyond the vitrines encasing them. The corridor connecting to the larger galleries is an educational area with a selection of books, photographs and video as well as a map contextualizing where the artist is from—the Kitikmeot Region of Nunavut; the natural materials used for his work are displayed behind glass. The room that follows contains most of the sculpture, the pieces so definitive of Sikkuark’s oeuvre—and his genius— the otherworldly constructions of bone and stone; intriguing little snow worms, imagined from the legends his father told him of the transformative beings that endured the northern winters to come to life again when warm temperatures return.

In the next two rooms, drawings are installed. Since, by 2002, the dust from the sculpting process was impacting Sikkuark’s health, he took to paper. On flat surfaces, he still maintained the wit and uncanniness present in his sculpture. Midway through the exhibition a short doc was screened, focusing on his role as father and friend. A surprising fact—a young Sikkuark planned on joining the priesthood, and, once deciding otherwise, continued to serve the Catholic Church throughout his life. Yet in none of his works is Catholicism evidenced; rather, his oeuvre is of shamans, legends and land. This profound omission provokes questions, ones not answered or entertained in the exhibition. The psychological spaces in his drawings point to tensions below the surface or coming from above—The Bear Who Stole a Kayak, 2003; Untitled (Spirit in a Cairn?), 2005; Untitled (Shaman Departing Camp?), 2004; Untitled (Pixelated Hunter), 2008—an interior spiritual landscape unspoken but deftly depicted. The conventional hanging of the drawings in uniform frames scaled slightly larger than the size of the paper constrains Sikkuark’s worlds. As many of his drawings point beyond the paper’s edge, expanding the frame would have elevated them. Considering Sikkuark’s words regarding his sculptures of shamans and spirits— “When I carve them I make them live”—rotating them and/or lights moving to cast shadows like sun on the land would have animated them dimensionally. A dividing wall wrapped in an image of tundra camouflages sculpture into the land behind rather than visually emerging from within it.

The accompanying catalogue is comprehensive, ensuring Sikkuark’s legacy. It augments the exhibition journey with its inclusion of interviews with those who knew him personally and professionally, including exhibition curator Christine Lalonde, associate curator, Indigenous Art, at the time of the exhibition’s inception and now associate curator, Canadian Art. For Lalonde, Sikkuark is “through and through a quiet and bold experimenter, a meticulous and intuitive perfectionist and a sharp and gentle storyteller, who takes the viewer to places only he could imagine.”

As institutions debate decolonization, artists are impacted, particularly Indigenous artists, many of whom wear multiple professional hats—scholar, installer, archivist, curator—out of necessity. As well, the institutional load bearing is done by the lower portion of the governance structure, often the ones left to piece it back together. The process: one step forward, two steps back. Sikkuark’s Untitled (Little Person Toppling Inukshuk), 2004, succinctly sums it up. ❚

“Nick Sikkuark: Humour and Horror / ᓂᑯᓚ ᓯᑯᐊ. ᐃᒡᓚᕐᓇᖅᑐᑦ ᐊᒻᒪ ᑲᑉᐱᐊᓇᖅᑐᑦ” was exhibited at the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, from November 17, 2023, to March 24, 2024.

Leah Snyder is a digital designer and writer with a focus on how artists and art institutions use virtual spaces and digital technology for cultural transformation.