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It started as many good stories begin – from a restaurant. Two friends, both well-known professionals. Two glasses and a bottle of good Riesling. One throws out an idea and the other gets interested. A long conversation follows. Another bottle of Riesling. More discussion. Ideas fly and vision becomes brighter. Notes are being made on a napkin. A promise and a handshake. The Glass is born.

Tiina Itkonen’s exhibition Anori – Silence of the Glacier draws a picture of the lives of the world’s northernmost indigenous people, the Inughuit* of northwestern Greenland; their families, communities and landscapes. A landscape threatened by climate change.

In the Arctic areas, temperatures are rising over two times faster than in the rest of the world. The sea ice in Greenland is dwindling at an alarming pace. The Inughuit can no longer reach their traditional hunting grounds. Dog sled trails are disappearing. The Inughuit rely on traditional ice fishing for food, but it also defines their cultural identity. It may well be that this ancient way of life will be forever lost. 

Photographic artist Tiina Itkonen has been photographing in Greenland since 1995. Recently she has also photographed in Alaska and the Antarctic. Itkonen has traveled more than 1500 kilometers along the west coast of Greenland by dogsled, fishing boat, sailboat, oil tanker, cargo ship, helicopter and small plane. Along the way she has stayed in small villages and gotten to know local people in Greenland. Itkonen says she spends 5 percent of her time taking photographs and 95 percent getting to know people. The photographer’s language skills and the time she has spent with people have opened doors for her and built mutual trust.

Itkonen does not fail to recognize her role as an outsider in the communities. In Greenland, she is always qallunaaq, a foreigner and an outsider. A photograph always portrays the photographer’s point of view and their perception of reality. This exhibition seeks to stir conversation on the role of an outsider photographer portraying a minority community. At the same time the exhibition explores the ways a photographer can use their work to depict the effects of climate change on people’s lives.

Tiina Itkonen has invited Julie Hardenberg (b. 1971), a Greenlandic artist who now resides in Denmark, to participate in the exhibition. Part of Itkonen’s inspiration to head to Greenland was due to meeting Hardenberg in the early 1990s. Hardenberg’s art focuses on questions of identity and postcolonialism.

*Greenland (Greenlandic: Kalaallit Nunaat) is home to ca. 56 000 people, over 90% of whom are Inuit. The northernmost group of Inuit, the Inughuit, live in northwestern Greenland.

Tiina Itkonen (b. 1968)

Itkonen graduated as a photographer from the Turku School of Art and Communication in 1995 and received her MA from the University of Art and Design Helsinki in 2002. Itkonen has photographed Arctic landscapes, Greenland and its inhabitants since 1995. Itkonen has received the Young Photographer of the Year Award in 2003 and the State Prize for Photographic Art in 2019.