If you have taken a walk around our Keele Campus recently, perhaps while playing the latest mobile gaming sensation Pokémon Go, you may have noticed a very large and distinctive newcomer taking up residence in front of the York Lions Stadium.
Ahqahizu, a monumental granite sculpture, officially “moved in” on June 21 at an unveiling ceremony in honour of National Aboriginal Day. I have had several opportunities to comment on the incredible scope and impact of this project, the talented work of Inuit artists Ruben Komangapik and Koomuatuk (Kuzy) Curley, and to register my appreciation that the soccer-playing Ahqahizu will represent the beautiful game at York in perpetuity.
Inuk musician & Governor General's Performing Arts Award winner Susan Aglukark performs at sculpture unveiling.
Having such a visible and powerful marker of Inuit art and cultural identity on campus will help to spark broader dialogue and engagement with our Indigenous communities in Toronto and at the University. Following the unveiling ceremony, our Vice-Provost Academic Alice Pitt offered her own reflections on the significance of this new presence on campus:
"Rob Lackie, on behalf of the Toronto Urban Katimavvik, points out that over one thousand Inuk people live in Toronto. Many joined us for the unveiling, and Ahqahizu’s presence reminds York of its responsibility to improve educational opportunities for Indigenous people, and it is a powerful and beautiful symbol of hope and friendship.” – Alice Pitt, Vice-Provost Academic, York University
It is highly appropriate, then, that Ahqahizu is one of the first things visitors to campus will see when York hosts Indigenous athletes from across North America at the next North American Indigenous Games (NAIG), which will take place for the first time in both Toronto and Ontario in 2017. To celebrate this announcement about the Games, we were proud to welcome to campus on May 26 a number of community partners and government officials, including Canada’s Minister of Sport & Persons with Disabilities, Carla Qualtrough, and Ontario’s Minister of Tourism, Culture & Sport, Michael Coteau.
Both the North American Indigenous Games and this iconic work of Inuit art are the result of longstanding collaboration among community members, neighbours and partners, and an integral part of a vital and growing engagement with Indigenous issues and representation on our campus and beyond.
Speaking to how Ahqahizu’s presence will positively impact the York community in the years to come, MICH Project leader Professor Anna Hudson perhaps said it best:
“One of my students did an on-campus survey asking what people knew about Canada’s arctic and Inuit people. I believe their answers would be different now that Ahqahizu is here to stay. This is a step along the way to the Indigenization of our campus.” – Anna Hudson, Associate Professor Canadian Art History and Curatorial Studies, York University
