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ITTOQQORTOORMIINIIT
OQALUTTUAT
sisamat nassaarisimagamigit, taagukkaminik
“Illoqarfik Scoresbysundimik pilersitsisoq”
taassuma nunasiaatip iluani Ittoqqortoormiut
inoqalersimmagu inunnik Ammassalimmiit
(ullumikkut Tasiilaq) inoqalersillugu. Taakkua
piffissamik ersinngitsumik tappissilersiinnarnani
aamma aqqutissiuummani oqaluttuarisaanermik
amigaat piviusuusoq nassaarineranut.
Danskit illoqarfissuata avatinnguani Arkep
nassaariortorpai assit nunasiaatilinneersut
aammalu Danmarkimiit sulisut tikisitat assilisarisimasaat
inunnik kalaallinik kinaassusiligaanngitsunik
ulikkaartut. Kinaassutsimik
suminngaanneerneranilluunniit paasissutissartaqanngimmata
“assit tunngaviusumik
naleqanngikkaluarput” Arkep oqaatigaa.
Taamaalilluni kinaassusersorlugit aallartippai.
Siullermik assit 1924-32-imeersut
soqutigineruai, tassa nunasiaalernerup ukiui
siulliit – Illoqqortoormiormiut namminneq suli
assiliisalinngikkallarmata. Kusanartulianik
inuunermullu tunngasut kisiisa pillugit misissuisimanngilaq.
Sumut kalaallit pisimanersut
naak neriorsorneqarsimagaluartut pissutsinik
nutaanik pitsaalluinnartunik (piniarfigissaartunik),
Ammassalik/Tasiilaq qimakkunikku
niuertoqarfik nutaaq nunagilerunikku, aammattaaq
pissutsit qanoq ittut atuutilissanersut
nuutsitat tikisitat kalaallit qallunaallu akornanni.
Taamatut ingerlatsineq ileqqorissaarnermut
soqutiginninneruvoq biopolitikkimut geopolitikkumullu
naapitsineq.
1933-imi Haag-imi eqqartuussivissuup
aalajangerpaa Danmarkip Norgellu Scoresbysundimut
tunngatillugu aaqqiagiinngissutaat.
Aalajangiinerup Danmarkip naalaagaassusersuani
takutissinnaanngorpaa aammami
erfalasortik kapputereersimagamikku. Tassani
oqaatigineqarsinnaavoq pissutsit pitsaalluinnartut
atuutilermata – ilisimatusarneq, sakkutooqarneq
kusanartuliornerlu eqqarsaatigalugit.
Nunasiaqarnerup nukinnik ingerlatsinermini
nunasiaammiit illoqarfinngortitsinermini
Illoqqortoormiut oqaluttuarisaanera danskit
qaliaannut naqqullu ataanut nutsertippai, taakkunani
assiisiviit pisarmata puigugaallutillu.
Taamaattumik isumaqarluarpoq Arkep oqaluttuarisaaneq
ingerlaartoq aamma uninngasoq
misissuiffigimmagu.
Ittoqqortoormiiniit Oqaluttuat aqqutigalugu
periarfissaqalerpoq imminnut qanillisarnissaat.
Atuakkap tamatta sutigulluunniit peqataatippaatigut
nunasiaanerup siornagut pissutsinut.
Iluani pilersitsivoq nunasiaanerup siornagut
piffimmik, tassani akerleriit piujunnaarnerat
imaluunniit piunerat atorunnaarsinneqarfigaat;
akerleriit immikkoortinneqarsinnaajunnaarnerat,
kisiannili tassaniittuartut.
Soorlu Carsten Juhlip erseqqissaaneratut:
“Killiunerusut imminnut paasinninnerat imminnut
atugartuussusertik nalliuttorsiuutigalugu
ukiuni sorsuffiunngitsuni nunarsuullu sinnera
puiguinnarlugu, taava nunasiaataaneq sioqqullugu
piffissap pissusaa piffissamut naapertuuppoq.”
THEME SECTION 5: STORIES FROM SCORESBYSUND
Taking its departure in Pia Arke’s
major work, the book Stories from
Scoresbysund, this section considers
the strength of her method: What is it
that Arke’s artistic research succeeds in
saying something decisive about?
The section is literary filled with
main works: Dummy (1995-2003) – the
comprehensive picture and text work
which, as its title indicates, is a direct
precursor for Stories from Scoresbysund
and a work of art in its own right – the
photographic series Telegraphy (1996)
and “the coffee recycling work” Soil for
Scoresbysund (1998).
About the latter work Arke writes in
a letter to the co-author of Stories from
Scoresbysund, Stefan Jonsson: “One
may say that the work is anecdotal because
it is linked to my stay in Scoresbysund,
where my sister-in-law noticed me
throwing out the used coffee grounds.”
The coffee had to be thrown out, but
through the window – to compost on the
town’s otherwise barren stony ground. “I
thought that was interesting in various
ways. Scoresbysund was founded because
of a misunderstanding there where it
is situated today. And with the whole
idea of Denmark’s rights to Greenland’s
underground, etc. the work has quite a
lot of depth historically. But it can also be
viewed without knowing these things.”
With 151 old coffee filters wound about
with string and laid out in a square Arke
practises the art of the impossible: she
gets hold of a potentiality, a space of
possibility without a predetermined goal.
A space where linear history cannot be
written, but where temporary histories
are negotiated and created; histories that
depart from the logic of conventional time
to embrace subjective experience.
She articulates the silence that surrounds
the bond between Greenland
and Denmark. This is clearly seen in
a work like Telegraphy, which deals
with how the meeting of opposites and
the communication across distances
and abysses change forever those who
meet and what is communicated. And
she articulates the passing by in silence
of the fact that the bond between past
and future – the progress of history and
what underpins the now – ties itself
into knots when it has to find room for
individualised subjective time.
Arke remains cool and does not try to
cut the knot with a heroic stroke of the
sword, even though the sword that was
called postcolonial studies was on offer
from abroad. Instead she slogged away
in one work after the other to loosen
that knot and, if possible, arrange it a
little more humanely.
Stories from Scoresbysund is in many
ways her crowning work. The work was
occasioned by the finding in 1995 of four
photo albums in the home of the son of
Ejnar Mikkelsen, whom she laconically
called “the inventor of Scoresbysund
town”, as it was he who was in charge of
the colonisation of Ittoqqortoormiit with
inhabitants from Angmagssalik (today
Tasiilaq). The photos put her on the track
not only of the lost time but also of a de
facto historical lacuna.
In and around the Danish capital
Arke unearthed thousands of archival
and amateur photos taken by colonists
and migrant workers from Denmark and
populated by unidentified Greenlandic
subjects. As they were not provided with
information about persons or places,
“the photographs were in principle
without value”, she writes.
So she set about identifying them.
Initially she was interested in the period
around 1924-32, i.e. from the colonisation
and the first, formative years – a long
time before the Greenlanders in Ittoqqortoormiit
began to take photos themselves.
It was not just aesthetic and social
interests that made her investigate what
happened to the Greenlanders who been
promised a life of plenty (good hunting) if
they would leave Angmagssalik/Tasiilaq
and settle in the Danish colony, and how
the meeting between those who had been
removed and those who had come from
abroad, Greenlanders and Europeans,
worked out. There was also an ethical interest
in the meeting between biopolitics
and geopolitics that impelled the work.
In 1933 the International Court of
Justice at The Hague decided a dispute
between Denmark and Norway about the
area around Scoresbysund. The decision
meant that Denmark, which had not
only planted its flag but also its colonised
subjects at the spot, could make the final
moves in a game that gave the nation
sovereignty over all Greenland. Now one
could speak of times of plenty – scientifically,
militarily and aesthetically.
In parallel with colonialism’s transport
of resources from colony to metropole
Ittoqqortoormiit’s history was to a
large extent moved to Danish attics and
basements, rooms where old albums end
up and are forgotten. It therefore makes
good sense that Arke investigated both
the mobile and the place-bound history.
With Stories from Scoresbysund there
is now a way of bringing them closer to
one another. The book is a determined
engagement with the postcolonial condition
that we all find ourselves in one way
or another. In it an actual postcolonial
space is created in which the either-or of
these classical oppositions are rendered
inoperative; where oppositions can no
longer be viewed individually but are
always simultaneously present.
As Carsten Juhl points out: “While
the Western self-understanding can only
[celebrate] itself as civilisation in peacetime
and must suppress the world at all
other times, the postcolonial situation is
in accord with time.”
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