Arctic Mark in Stanley Park

My photograph of sled dogs, an upside-down sled, and the Three Hills from the April 1st Festivities on Queen's Bay, April 1st, 2006


Artist's rendering of previous photo, drawn on April 3, 2007 at the Holman Print Shop during a printmaking class sponsored by the local chapter of the AHF (Aboriginal Healing Foundation), and taught by artists Susie Malgokak and Elsie Klengenberg (creator of the famous TV t-shirt featured in an earlier post). Note how numerous distant tiny sled dogs in the original photo have become two very near, very large, and very cartoonish sled dogs in this artist's feverish imagination. Is this a justifiable case of "artistic licence" or merely evidence of an artist too lazy and unskilled to draw so many tiny dogs? We'll have to let history and the international art world be the judges, won't we?

If you'd like to see this exciting new work-in-progress by this previously unknown but up-and-coming local artist in more detail, you can have a look at the cover of this month's Photo Gallery, and also at the 6th photograph inside the Gallery, along with its accompanying commentary. In an exclusive interview, we asked Arctic Mark what inspired him to venture outside his regular day job as Helen Kalvak School Fundraising Bingo Caller to try his hand at printmaking, especially given the fact that his last serious art training was back in 1977-78, in Grade 9, where he ended up with a final grade of 65, a grade that seemed to undermine somewhat his art teacher's comment that Mark had "good potential" in art. Perhaps it was Mark's brief but memorable stint as a novice art teacher for a rowdy Grade 10 art class in his very first semester teaching at Pine Ridge S.S. in Pickering, Ontario? Or maybe it's as simple as this: maybe he just likes art, whether it be a Picasso or a Garfunkel? Here is Mark's actual answer: "If I had a million dollars, I'd buy everyone a piece of art from Holman/Ulukhaktok. Since the moment I arrived in July of 2005, I've been inspired by the incredible pool of talented artists here. The distinctive beauty and symbolic power of the prints made by local artists are an important part of local Inuvialuit culture, and I'm truly thrilled to have the chance to try my hand at this timeless art form in the legendary Holman Print Shop, under the guidance of some of the town's most celebrated artists. Oh, and did I mention that I just love sled dogs? They're so darned cute and cuddly, I could draw them all day long, and they'd still look like the cartoons I drew in Grade 7!"

Well, art fans (and readers named Art), stay tuned to this blogsite for upcoming previews of the ongoing progress of "Arctic Mark's First Print."