From igloo to Internet

Dedicated to indigenous populations of Canada, the exhibition “Arctic Adaptations” presents an unknown region, partly primitive, strong and essential, that lies between reality and imagination.

Arctic Adaptations Biennale Venezia
The exhibition representing Canada at the 2014 Venice Architecture Biennale is entitled “Arctic Adaptations: Nunavut at 15” and is housed in the pavilion in the Giardini designed by the BBPR group for Canada in 1958, a small and interesting work of architecture that reinterprets the form of the tepee, of the North American Indians.
The theme of territories and the indigenous populations of Canada is also the theme of this exhibition, that presents an overview of a vast and unknown territory in the north west of Canada, a province that was once known as the Northwest Territories but that in 1999 changed its name to Nunavut following a land claim agreement on behalf of the Inuit people.
Arctic Adaptations
Opening: detail of Corian bas-relief model of Gjoa Haven, Nunavut, Arctic Adaptations, 2014. Above: view of Arctic Adaptations exhibition, Arctic Adaptations, 2014. Photos Latreille Delage Photography
A few significant statistics: Nunavut is a territory of over 2,000,000 square kilometres, of which the land above sea-level is equivalent to 1,936,113 square kilometres and 157,077 are Arctic Ocean, making Nunavut the fifth largest regional entity in terms of extension that is not an independent state. 15% of these territories, 356,000 square kilometres – an area just slightly larger than Italy – is inhabited and controlled by the Inuit who today count for around 35,000 inhabitants living in around 25 different communities spread mainly in the southern part of these territories, above the tree line.
These communities are not connected via road and the only means of transport that connects them with the rest of Canada is air, rather than sea but only a few months of the year. The population of these communities ranges from around 120 inhabitants to almost 7,000 inhabitants in Iqalit, the capital of the region that lies about 2,500 km from Canada’s major cities. Until 1950 this population was mainly nomadic, it organised itself in seasonal camps linked to hunting and fishing but permanent settlements did not exist. More recently and for reasons linked to territorial sovereignty, trade and availability of natural resources, the Inuit population has become forced to be non-migratory, settling in villages to guarantee access to essential services and ensure connections with the rest of the country.
Arctic Adaptations
View of Arctic Adaptations exhibition, Arctic Adaptations, 2014. Photo Sergio Pirrone
In the 1970s, this region was affected by a joint programme between USA and Canada of military defence (DEW – Distant Early Warning) for which a line of defence was created that went from Alaska to Greenland and crossed the territories of the Canadian arctic, consisting of radar installations for the protection of North America from possible Soviet attack.

The settlements are mainly built inside bays and always along the coast, even though the relationship with the sea is denied for many months by a layer of ice that sits on the water, to the point that the sea itself offers endless pathways during the winter.

Airports are the chief resources of these communities. At Iqalit, the airport is closely connected with the urban layout of the settlement and the area in front of it seems to be the principal public space while its bright colour makes it an urban icon and a recognisable landmark for the town. As well as a number of buildings for services, schools, research centres, recreational centres, these settlements are made up of houses that use models and typologies that come from the south, possibly made more efficient from an energy point of view but with little attention given to traditional forms of defence against the snow, ice and winds that belonged to the Inuit.

Arctic Adaptations
View of Corian bas-relief models describing the present condition of Nunavut’s communities, and 5 proposals projecting architecture’s future roles in the territory, Arctic Adaptations, 2014. Photo Sergio Pirrone
The communities that lived in the Arctic and came to hunt and fish nowadays exist on subsidies and government funding. Despite this, research carried out in these centres tells us that today services are poor, there are no high schools, hospitals are in bordering regions so patients have to travel to get treatment. In terms of housing, 49% of the houses are below acceptable living standards, frequently overcrowded and in need of constant maintenance that is rarely carried out. The general situation therefore is not too good.

The interesting aspect of the exhibition at the Canadian pavilion is not so much the incisiveness or meaningfulness of a topic of research but rather how the exhibition describes the transition of a totally atypical territory towards modernity. The exhibition presents an unknown region, partly primitive, at the same time portraying a landscape that is strong and essential, unique and unrepeatable, a landscape that lies almost on the borders between reality and imagination.

A territory that has only marginally “absorbed modernity” in as much as it is totally extraneous to the processes of transformation that have affected other regions and anomalous with respect to the dynamics that have favoured contemporary development. Modernity in this region has always been declined according to technical demands and functional efficiency to guarantee to all the community an acceptable standard of living and access to basic services.

Arctic Adaptations
View of animated model showing housing proposal for Iqaluit, Arctic Adaptations; 2014. Photo Latreille Delage Photography
It has been said that the north has undergone a rapid transition over the course of the last forty years “from igloo to Internet” and that this region has moved abruptly from a primitive situation that mirrored local culture and tradition to a virtual modernity. Modernity is therefore principally linked to globalisation that has attempted to put these places on a par with anywhere else in the world. Local culture and traditions have been cancelled out in the name of an illusion of social and cultural integration, the extension of national supremacy even in these remote lands and an artificial desire to eliminate the strong differences that exist between these populations and all the other populations in Canada.

The tension between diversity and integration has been consumed with the hope that modernity becomes a solution to problems. The result is that young Inuits watch on average more hours of television than those of the same age in the rest of Canada and fries and coca-cola have quickly replaced foods that were more calibrated with respect to climate and local availability.

The crucial question is therefore how remote territories, populations and regions can confront modernity and how this marries with local traditions. In fact precisely due to this perhaps unresolved contradiction, the Canadian pavilion received a mention from the jury of the Biennale, for “the extensive study of how modernity manages to adapt in unique climatic conditions and to the demands of a cultural minority”.

Arctic Adaptations
View of animated territorial model of recreation proposal, showing existing and proposed networks of tourism, Arctic Adaptations; 2014. Photo Latreille Delage Photography
The exhibition also presents a number of projects made for this region by groups of students from schools of architecture at various Canadian universities, under the guidance of professional practices with experience in the Arctic and who have worked together with representatives of the local community. This pairing created strong and positive dynamics within the working groups with reciprocal and multiple influences. Furthermore, the local community was highly motivated by the fact that this work would be shown at the Venice Biennale, thus giving international visibility to their work and above all their region. The projects propose a future vision for the region of Nunavut, where the challenge is to interpret the character of these locations in order to create architecture that is strongly linked to place.
The projects form a counterpart to the meaningfulness of the principal objective of the exhibition, to describe an unknown territory that is both remote and fascinating. Having never been there personally, although keen on the idea of travelling to the Arctic in the future, for now I can only turn to the cliche of Streetview in Google Maps for a virtual wander around these places. What I have seen is definitely interesting and I would recommend all to look at.
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