Promoting and Marketing Inuit Art
In 25 years of publishing Inuit Art Quarterly (IAQ), we have witnessed the growing visibility of Inuit art in Canada and abroad. We have published articles on the history of Inuit art marketing, the cooperatives, and the labelling of art and fake art, as well as on efforts by other groups — in Siberia and elsewhere — to emulate the successful Canadian model for marketing and promoting an indigenous art. In a nutshell, that “model” consisted of only a few key players: community-based, Inuit-owned cooperatives; the federal government and a coterie of pioneering dealers and curators in southern Canada who succeeded in presenting some Inuit productions as art rather than as souvenirs.
Undoubtedly, it is a model that is breaking up. There are now a number of entrepreneurs who are peddling, as opposed to promoting, the art, and Inuit are being encouraged to set up websites and to market their art online. In effect, they are to be entrepreneurs as well as artists, a strategy that ignores the success that the network of northern co-ops — working with dealers — achieved in making Inuit productions a highly valued artform, rather than a trinket (Mitchell 2007:6–7). It also ignores the fact that different skills and functions are needed to bring an art to market. As sculptor Manasie Akpaliapik said: “I need the art galleries, because I don’t have the time to look for people to buy my art” (IAQ 1990b:9). He could also have said that he doesn’t have the knowledge, skills, and the connections to do what needs to be done.
There is a fine line between involving artists in marketing and promoting their art and making them responsible for selling it. Inuit Art Foundation (IAF) artists’ workshops always include a Business of Art module, which focuses on portfolio development, artists’ statements and résumés, the conventions of the art market, pricing, promotion, and the difference between the gift and the art markets. Because contemporary artists travel, read, and attend exhibitions, they are better positioned to collaborate with dealers and curators in the presentation of their art. It used to be the case that isolated, unilingual artists lost touch with their work after it left their hands, but they now have a different relationship with the collecting public. Previously excluded from conferences and symposia, many artists now participate in such forums in Canada and abroad.
There is also a fine line between art and souvenirs. The history of Inuit art makes it clear that it began as an economic development project, and efforts have been expended over the years to diversify what was referred to as “the arts and crafts industry” by developing new products. Parkas turned out in purpose-built fur factories and hand-sewn, die-cut sealskin ookpiks fall into that category (IAQ 1990a:45).
While there is still a need for economic development in impoverished arctic communities (where unemployment outstrips that of any city in southern Canada), IAF concentrates its efforts on the small group of people at the top of the pyramid who define themselves as professional artists and who have achieved critical success in the art world. If the reputation of Inuit art is healthy, it will sustain a market for the whole range of production, including the unique handcarved arctic animals and scenes treasured as gifts, but not included in major collections.
Although, for the most part, the old debates about Inuit art being nothing more than a commercial activity (anthropologist Edmund Carpenter’s thesis) have been put to rest, it is worth repeating an observation made by art historian Hal Opperman, who refers to a comment made by his colleague Rudolf Arnheim:
One of the most striking characteristics of the Inuit art phenomenon ... is its sudden and deliberate implantation. South met North, and along with this meeting came the commercial aspect that troubles a lot of outsiders, and many insiders too. I am referring to the suspicion that a contrived, non-spontaneous process can only produce a bogus art. Yet this is immediately belied by the works themselves, which are so manifestly “authentic” in every way. Inuit art is the result of a propitious interface between two alien cultures (Opperman 1986:1).
Hear! Hear!
Marybelle Mitchell, editor-in-chief of Inuit Art Quarterly
May 2011
References
Campbell, Heather
2001 (Summer) “Urban Inuit Artists”
Feheley, Patricia
2009 (Spring) “Terry Ryan: A Visionary with a Pragmatic Edge: Part One, Sketching a Future”
2009 (Summer) “Terry Ryan: A Visionary with a Pragmatic Edge: Part Two, Sketching a Future”
Finckenstein, Maria von
1997 (Winter) “Almost 50 Years of Inuit Art Exhibitions”
Goo-Doyle, Ovilu
1993 (Spring) “Three Baker Lake Artists Comment on the New Jessie Oonark Arts and Crafts Centre”
Gustavison, Susan
2002 (Summer) “Auctioning Inuit Art”
Hall, Judy
2009 (Spring) “Charles Gimpel: Early Promotion of Inuit Art in Europe”
Haqpi, Michael
1993 (Summer) “Carving Was Never Lost by Inuit: An Interview with Joanasie Kunilusie of Broughton Island”
Lister, Kenneth
2003 (Fall) “Looking into the Eye of the Spider: Some Thoughts about Context with Reference to Tuugaaq: Ivory Sculptures from the Eastern Canadian Arctic”
McKenna, Ed
1992 (Spring) “The Language of Inuit Art”
Mitchell, Marybelle
2009 (Fall) “Quite a Journey Indeed!”
2007 (Winter) “A New Strategy for Developing Inuit Arts: Encouraging and Disappointing”
2004 (Fall/Winter) “From Funky Teapots to Groundbreaking Movies: Inuit Art Still Draws a Crowd”
2000 (Fall) “A Subtle Corrective”
1990/91 (Fall/Winter) “The Eskimo Art Business: A History and Analysis of the Cooperative Movement in the Arctic”
Opperman, Hal
1986 (Summer) “The Inuit Phenomenon in Art-Historical Context”
Watt, Virginia
1993 (Spring) “Imitation Native Art”
Vorano, Norman
2006 (Spring) “Marketing Inuit Art: Notes from the Nunavut Arts Festival in Iqaluit, September 2–9”
Inuit Art Quarterly
2005 (Summer) “Remembering Saumik: James Houston 1921–2005”
1991 (Spring) “An Interview with Abraham Anghik”
1990/91 (Fall/Winter) “History at a Glance;” “Who Sells Inuit Art, and How?”
1990a (Spring) “Printmaking Reprieve?”
1990b (Spring) “Speaking for Themselves: Eight Inuit Artists Compare Notes during a Seminar Organized by the Inuit Art Foundation”
Selected references from Inuit Art Quarterly (IAQ)
Editorials
1992, Commentary, vol. 7, no. 2(spring):61, by George Swinton 1.23 Mb - 2000, A Subtle Corrective, vol. 15, no. 3(fall):3, by Marybelle Mitchell 400.91 Kb
- 2004, From Funky Teapots to Groundbreaking Movies: Inuit Art Still Draws a Crowd, vol. 19, no. 3&4(fall/winter):8, by Marybelle Mitchell 339.31 Kb
- 2007, A New Strategy for Developing Inuit Arts: Encouraging and Disappointing, vol. 22, no. 4(winter):6-7, by Marybelle Mitchell 75.77 Kb
Features
- 1990-91, Who Sells Inuit Art, and How?, vol. 5, no. 4(fall/winter):44 4.70 Mb
- 1990-91, History at a Glance, vol. 5, no. 4(fall/winter):24 1.49 Mb
- 1990-91, The Eskimo Art Business: A History and Analysis of the Cooperative Movement in the Arctic, vol. 5, no. 4(fall/winter):28, by Marybelle Mitchell 4.05 Mb
- 1992, The Language of Inuit Art, vol. 7, no. 2(spring):22, by Ed McKenna 1.57 Mb
- 1993, Imitation Native Art, vol. 8, no. 1(spring):48, by Virginia Watt 1.63 Mb
- 1997, Almost 50 Years of Inuit Art Exhibitions, vol. 12, no. 4(winter):3, by Maria von Finkenstein 3.03 Mb
- 2001, Urban Inuit Artists, vol. 16, no. 2(summer):4, by Heather Campbell 2.62 Mb
- 2002, Auctioning Inuit Art, vol. 17, no. 2(summer):20, by Susan Gustavison 5.23 Mb
- 2003, Looking Into the Eye of the Spider: Some Thoughts About Context with Reference to Tuugaaq: Ivory Sculptures from the Eastern Canadian Arctic, vol. 18, no. 3(fall):10, by Kenneth Lister 4.18 Mb
- 2005, Remembering Saumik: James Houston 1921-2005, vol. 20, no. 2(summer):25 5.08 Mb
- 2006, Marketing Inuit Art: Notes from the Nunavut Arts Festival in Iqaluit, September 2-9, vol. 21, no. 1(spring):21, by Norman Vorano 3.36 Mb
Interviews
- 1991, An Interview with Abraham Anghik, vol. 6, no. 2(spring):18 6.92 Mb
- 1993, Carving Was Never Lost By Inuit: An Interview with Joansie Kunilusie of Broughton Island, vol. 8, no. 2(summer):9, by Michael Haqpi 408.13 Kb
- 1993, Three Baker Lake Artists Comment on the New Jessie Oonark Arts & Crafts Centre, vol. 8, no. 1(spring):53, by Ovilu Goo-Doyle 2.79 Mb
News Items
- 1996, Inuit Art Sales Total $275,000 at Toronto Auction, vol. 11, no. 4(winter):45 532.50 Kb
- 2002, Record-breaking Auction, vol. 17, no. 1(spring):51 405.39 Kb
- 2003, Waddington's Holds Inuit Art Auction, vol. 18, no. 3(winter):34 362.85 Kb
- 2006, Waddington's Sets New Benchmark for Inuit Art, vol. 21, no. 1(spring):31 551.17 Kb