FLAHERTY NYC
PRESENTS SEASON 24 | FALL 2022
program 1
LET ME INTRODUCE MYSELF
Monday, October 10, 7 pm
Anthology Film Archives
Please purchase your tickets advance online because we are expecting to sell out!
Special opening celebration–with games! Albert’s Garden, 5–6:45 pm. AT CAPACITY.
** In collaboration with NYU Cinema Studies Department Friday Night Screening Series & NYU Center for Media, Culture and History, this screening will repeat on Friday, October 14th at Michelson Theater, NYU Department of Cinema Studies (721 Broadway 6th Floor). The event will be moderated by Iñupiaq filmmaker Andrew Okpeaha MacLean.
UPDATE: The screening is now hybrid, with the films and discussion available ONLINE ONLY for non-NYU attendees. The event is free but requires advance registration here:
Still from THREE THOUSAND, courtesy asinnajaq
film notes
Jobie Weetaluktuk films an urban inukshuk | photo by Kat Baulu
Jobie Weetaluktuk
INUKSHOP
2009, 2 min, digital
Inuit filmmaker Jobie Weetaluktuk mixes archival and new footage to make a statement about the appropriation of his culture throughout history.
asinnajaq
THREE THOUSAND
2017, 14 min, digital
“My father was born in a spring igloo—half snow, half skin. I was born in a hospital, with jaundice and two teeth.”
Inuk artist Asinnajaq plunges us into a sublime imaginary universe—14 minutes of luminescent, archive-inspired cinema that recast the past, present, and future of Inuit in a radiant new light.
Diving into the National Film Board of Canada’s vast archive, she parses the complicated cinematic representation of the Inuit, harvesting fleeting truths and fortuitous accidents from a range of sources—newsreels, propaganda, ethnographic docs, and works of Inuit filmmakers. Embedding historic footage into original animation, she conjures up a vision of hope and beautiful possibility.
Produced by the NFB, Three Thousand is directed by asinnajaq, also known as Isabella Weetaluktuk, and produced by Kat Baulu.
Image courtesy of Documentary Educational Resources
Jobie Weetaluktuk
UMIAQ SKIN BOAT
2008, 31 min, betacam-to-digital
Umiaq Skin Boat is a beautiful and poetic 30-minute film about a group of Inuit elders in Inukjuak, Quebec who decide one summer to build the first traditional seal skin boat their community has seen in over 50 years. Once an essential vessel for travel and for hunting large prey like bowhead whales, the umiaq has been replaced in modern times by canoes powered with outboard motors. Over the course of working together on the boat, the elders recount astonishing stories of survival while navigating volatile and unforgiving Arctic waters, and of dangers both natural and man-made. Shot against the magnificent backdrop of the northern landscape, Umiaq Skin Boat bears witness to the resilience of the Inuit spirit in changing times.
filmmakers
Inuk writer, editor, broadcaster and filmmaker Jobie Weetaluktuk was born in a summer igloo 50 kilometres from Inukjuak. His first documentary, Qallunajatut: Urban Inuk (2005), screened around the world, winning the Rigoberta Menchu Grand Prize at the Montréal First Peoples Festival. His credits include Kakkalaakkuvik (Where the Children Dwell) (2009), a deeply personal perspective on the impact of residential schooling, and Timuti, a heartfelt study of the Inuit practices surrounding childbirth and naming.
“Weetaluktuk’s films navigate how Inuit cultural heritage contrasts and informs contemporary Inuit communities while continuing to address the ongoing effects of colonialism” –Inuit Art Foundation
asinnajaq is from Inukjuak, Nunavik, and lives in Tiohtià:ke (Montreal).
Her work includes filmmaking, writing, and curating. She co-created Tilliraniit, a three-day festival celebrating Inuit art and artists. asinnajaq’s work has been exhibited at art galleries and film festivals around the world. asinnajaq wrote and directed Three Thousand (2017) a short sci-fi documentary. She co-curated Isuma’s presence in the Canadian Pavilion at the 58th Venice Biennale. She co-curated the inaugural exhibition INUA at the Qaumajuq. In 2020 asinnajaq received a Sobey Art Award.
moderator
Andrew Okpeaha MacLean
Andrew Okpeaha MacLean (Writer/Director) is an Iñupiaq filmmaker born and raised in Alaska. His feature film debut On the Ice premiered at Sundance 2011 and won Best First Feature and the Crystal Bear for Generations 14plus at the 2011 Berlin International Film Festival; The FIPRESCI Prize for Best New American Film at the Seattle International Film Festival; and Best Feature and Best Cinematography at the 2011 Woodstock Film Festival. He was also named Best Director for his work in On the Ice for the 2011 American Indian Film Festival.
His short film Sikumi premiered at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival where it won the Jury Prize in Short Filmmaking. Other films include Natchiliagniaqtuguk Aapagalu (Seal Hunting With Dad), which had its premiere at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival, Kinnaq Nigaqtuqtuaq (The Snaring Madman), which won Best Short film at the 2006 American Indian Film Festival, Such A Perfect Day, and When The Season Is Good: Artists Of Arctic Alaska, a feature documentary. In 2008, he was named one of 25 New Faces of Independent Film by Filmmaker Magazine.
