Five Years in Kingaiit (Cape Dorset), Nunavut “The Centre of Inuit Art” Public Talk by Michael Soares

From 2010 to 2015, Michael Soares lived in Kingaiit, working at Peter Pitseolak School. Art was one of the main reasons that attracted Soares to this remote community on the shores of South-Central Baffin Island in Canada’s Eastern Arctic. In the early 1960s, Soares first heard about Kenojuak Ashevak while he was a student at The Halifax Grammar School. Kenojuak, a Cape Dorset Inuit, is considered a pioneer in modern Canadian art. In 1970, she became Canada’s first living woman artist to have work published on a Canadian postage stamp. A “lapsed” stamp collector, Soares still has that 6-cent stamp. In 2010, he jumped at the opportunity to join the staff at Peter Pitseolak School.

Mike Soares is not an authority on art. His talk is a reflection of his experience living in Kingaiit, Nunavut, a community that prides itself as “The Centre of Inuit Art.”