June 17 – November 14, 2020

Visit the exhibition website. 

‘Tuktuuyaqtuuq’ is the Inuvialuktun name of Maureen Gruben’s (UVic Alumni, BFA ‘12) home on the Arctic coast (known in English as ‘Tuktoyaktuk’). It means, ‘Looks Like a Caribou.’ The tuktu/caribou are integral to Inuvialuit life, providing food, clothes, tools, stories.

In TUKTUUYAQTUUQ, Gruben works with multiple facets of the animal: the translucent heart sac, the intricate patterning of bone seams on skulls that are reminiscent of waterways curving through the land. In her careful attention to life-sustaining physical elements, Gruben also traces the caribou’s vast immaterial presence in her culture.