Where North Begins: Eight Perspectives On What It Means To Live In The North

What is North? Do we think about the North solely from the perspective of our own position in the world? What does it take to be an artist living and working in the North? Are there any common threads that connect these regions? These are just a few of the questions explored in the exhibition Is This North?, currently on view at the Nordic House.

Is This North? is a multimedia group exhibition featuring works by artists from the North of Finland, Norway, Sweden, Iceland, Greenland, Siberia, Alaska and Canada — namely, Gunnar Jónsson, Anders Sunna, Máret Ánne Sara, Inuuteq Storch, Nicholas Galanin, Dunya Zakha, Marja Helander, and Maureen Gruben.

“What was also important was that the artists wouldn’t be living in Berlin or New York.”

Originally exhibited at the Akureyri Art Museum, Is This North? has now made its way to Reykjavík, where it will be open to the public until April. I caught up with curators Daría Sól Andrews and Hlynur Hallsson to discuss what the exhibition seeks to explore.

From the coldest corners

Hlynur and Daría began planning the exhibition nearly two years ago. “We wanted to do an exhibition on artists from the North — really North — Sámi artists, Greenland, Alaska, Siberia, northern Canada — and try to see if there was something they all had in common. What are they telling us?,” says Hlynur.

At the time, he was the Director of the Akureyri Art Museum, so it felt natural for the exhibition to debut there. Now, in Reykjavík, the layout of the space has given the show a new life — some pieces have changed, and the basement of the Nordic House, with its darker setting, adds to a “more dramatic” atmosphere, as Hlynur puts it, compared to the bright, open space in Akureyri.

“What was also important was that the artists wouldn’t be living in Berlin or New York, that they would be active where they came from, where they were born,” Hlynur explains. The curators managed to achieve this goal with the exception of one artist — Dunya Zakha, an artist from Siberia, who now lives in the USA.

“After the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we thought, ‘Should we have an artist from Russia?’,” Hlynur explains. “Then we thought it was important to have some indigenous artists from that area.”

“Dunya is from Yakutia, in northern Siberia — the coldest inhabited place on the Earth, where it gets to around -40°C,” adds Daría. “Given the political situation in Russia, we felt that it was important to include artists from this area. Dunya also told us that many indigenous artists from this area are being censored by the Russian government right now.”

“Now you hear Greenland every day in the news. Two years ago, it was not like that.”

Now based in New York, Dunya insisted on being credited as an artist from Siberia, not a Russian artist.

Timely matters

The current geopolitical situation in the North — take, for example, U.S. President Donald Trump’s ongoing threats against Greenland — makes the exhibition particularly timely. “Now you hear Greenland every day in the news,” says Hlynur. “Two years ago, it was not like that. Same with Alaska — what’s happening in the States right now with indigenous people is even more of an issue than it was two years ago.”

Daría adds that the exhibition aims to offer a deeper understanding of what it means to live in Arctic regions. “It’s not a show explicitly about climate change or global warming, but those themes kind of resonate throughout, because it’s what you deal with when you live in these areas,” she says.

Both curators agree that artists from the North have become increasingly visible and are gaining international recognition. “Three or four years ago, the Scandinavian pavilion at the Venice Biennale wasn’t a Scandinavian pavilion, it was a Sámi pavilion,” Hlynur points out.

Last year, Greenlandic photographer Inuuteq Storch became the first Greenlander to represent Denmark at the Venice Biennale. At Is This North? Innuteq presents a series of black and white photographs that often capture intimate surroundings, including friends and family. “He’s talking about indigenous connection to the afterlife — how his people have a really strong relationship with death and the people who pass on and probably communicate with the afterlife,” Daría explains. “He’s approaching his photography practice through a deep colonialist viewpoint, taking back the power of how Greenlandic people are documented and photographed, and trying to preserve the image and life of his people through his own lens.”

Land, identity and art

The work of Finnish Sámi artist Marja Helander stands out in the exhibition with her captivating video piece Birds in the Earth, which follows ballerina sisters Birit and Katja Haarla. The film takes dancers through diverse landscapes — from the snow-covered villages of the Sápmi region in Northern Finland to the concrete facade of Finland’s parliament building in Helsinki — exploring profound questions of land ownership and indigenous sovereignty for the Sámi, who are the only indigenous people within the European Union.

Birds in the Earth, Marja Helander

Birds in the Earth is a poetic journey that contrasts the structured discipline of ballet with the backdrop of wild nature. Within just a few minutes, viewers are introduced to the traditional Sámi vocal art of joik and learn about the vital role of reindeer herding for Sámi survival.

Marja has a few other works on display at the exhibition, one of which is a photograph from Kiruna, Sweden. It depicts a mountain being mined for its minerals, ultimately changing the landscape.

“It’s not the kind of initial landscape that you would associate with the Nordic countries,” says Daría.

Anders Sunna, a Sámi artist from northern Sweden, brings attention to the history of the eradication of Sámi culture — the loss of land and rights, affecting reindeer herding families, including his own. Anders works with large-scale paintings and graffiti that are often political.

Asking questions

Representing Iceland in the exhibition is Gunnar Jónsson, whose sound and video work occupies a separate room.

Initially, ​​Hlynur wanted to include an artist from North Iceland. Gunnar, however, is based in Ísafjörður in the Westfjords. “But then I thought, well, if you’re not from Iceland, you see the Westfjords as definitively North Iceland. You can’t get any further North than that.”

Gunnar created a new piece specifically for the exhibition where as Hlynur explains, “He confronts the signal lights for both the airport and ships, and how how they irritate some, but they are, in a poetical way, also important — they are the reason why people can live there in the North West of Iceland.” He’s referring to the obstruction lighting placed on the mountain in Ísafjörður, which guides planes safely to land when approaching from behind the peak.

“I knew that many of the artists are working very politically, but I didn’t realise they are so much into their heritage and defending what has been done wrong to their people,” Hlynur admits at the end of our conversation. “I hope the exhibition will answer some questions, but it raises many more.”

Is This North? is free to visit at the Nordic House until April 27. See opening times: nordichouse.is