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  • Kiviuq Returns: A Collaborative and Decolonized Process for Creating Inuit Theatre
  • Ellen Hamilton (bio)
Keywords

Inuit theatre, Qaggiavuut, Inuit performing arts, Indigenous theatre

“Stories are very important. I always tried hard to remember them. But now I am forgetting.” So said Qaunaq Mikigak of Cape Dorset, an Inuit elder and knowledge keeper who shared stories and songs about the legendary Inuit hero Kiviuq this winter with artists creating theatre based on his adventures. I work with Qaggiavuut, a society dedicated to supporting the Nunavut performing arts, and we have gathered together performers and elders from communities across Canada’s Arctic this year to build new Inuit theatre work. Qaunaq has always held fast to the stories and songs that she was taught as a child and is a rich resource.

The Qaggiavuut Society was formed in 2010, and the organization has made it one of their goals to identify, record, and film ancient Arctic stories and songs that are at risk. We know that the last generation of Inuit to have grown up on the land is rapidly disappearing, and with them the experiences of traditional knowledge, language, and culture. When Qaunaq was a child, she fell asleep to the quiet voices of her grandparents who told legends filled with drama and excitement. In the sod house, the sealskin tent, and the iglu, Inuit children were provided with the skills honed by the imagination being lit with storytelling until colonization brought an end to a practice discouraged by many Christian missionaries. Despite the pressure to forget, many Inuit held onto these stories, and they are a gold mine for today’s creators of contemporary Inuit art and for all who seek to understand the human journey.

This is why one night in February I found myself rushing my truck through blustery Iqaluit streets to pick up another incredible elder, Miriam Aglukark from Gjoa Haven, who is one of Nunavut’s finest storytellers. As always, she graciously agreed to be filmed while telling us a Kiviuq legend. “Which one would you like to hear?” she asks. Miriam expertly recounts some of the hundreds of Kiviuq legends that are told across the Arctic, and sings the songs that accompany them. She modulates her voice, acting out the voices of the animals and the spirits and had us all laughing until we cried at the antics of little animals who flirt with Kiviuq.


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Christine Tootoo as Sea Woman.

Photo by Jamie Griffiths

This spring, Qaggiavuut ran a one-week workshop with Inuit performers and elders Susan Avingaq and Madeline Ivalu, from Igloolik to learn more stories of Kiviuq. Susan whispered tales of the fearsome Bee Woman scraping a human skin and firing ulus (women’s knife) at Kiviuq as he tried to escape becoming her soup. [End Page 105] These and other tales form the basis of Kiviuq Returns a one-hour theatre performance that begins a tour of Nunavut communities this summer.


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Lois Suluk and Damien Tulugarjuk during the April rehearsals in Iqaluit.

Photo by Jamie Griffiths

Following the story collection process with elders, a few of us weaved an outline for a theatrical performance with ideas from Taqralik Partridge, a Nunavik spoken-word artist and throat singer, and Vinnie Karetak, an Arviat-born actor, producer, and director. A decision was made early on to only use stories told to us by living elders who remembered them from their childhoods. The elders were filmed and recorded and Qaggiavuut program manager, Looee Arreak, edited and translated their stories. Looee also made the final decision about which versions of the five stories selected were chosen as projections.

A cast of eight talented Inuit performers from across Canada’s Arctic were brought together to work for four weeks in southern Canadian performing arts spaces to shape the outline into a one-hour dramatization through movement, song, and spoken word. They were mentored and guided by co-directors Vinnie Karetak and veteran actor Martha Burns. Qaggiavuut partnered with Kingston’s Isabel Bader Centre for Performing Arts and the Banff Centre to provide residencies to workshop the show. Nunavut is the only territory...

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