Marion Tuu'luq

"The verb "paint" derives from the Latin root pignere, meaning to paint, but also to embroider or tattoo. In more than one sense it is thus a fitting word to bring to a discussion of the works of Marion Tuu'luq. For some twenty years, this artist painted with woolen fabrics and cotton treads, stitching an art of many layers, both metaphoric and physical. Initially called neevingatah in Inuktitut, which became the rather prosaic "wall hanging" in English, Tuu'luq's appliqued and embroidered pieces are more aptly described as "works on cloth". These works have been coloured by the palette of her experience of living in the Canadian Arctic before and during the social, economic, and political transformations that have marked the North for much of the past century - that is, for much of her life.