The world’s first purpose built Inuit art centre, Qaumajug (pronounced Kow-my-ug) will open in late March and it is a temple to beauty, inside and out. The white granite exterior of the $55 million addition to the Winnipeg Art Gallery feels like an undulating snowbank, an icy glacier or a rolling expanse of frozen ice.  Or maybe an ice palace. It’s the perfect architectural metaphor for the art inside.

WAG director and CEO Stephen Borys sees the new space as a place to bring communities together through art. Art, he believes, is a voice that opens hearts and minds, that fuels and inspires. 

Architect Michael Maltzan designed the building to house the largest public collection of Inuit Art in the world. Personal visits to the North framed the design and guided the idea that the new gallery would stand in dialogue with the existing Gustave da Rosa-designed WAG.

Fittingly, the name Qaumajug means “It is bright. It is lit“. The snow-white exterior leads in to interior galleries lit by 22 skylights. Maltzan was particularly struck by the quality of light in Winnipeg and in the North. His building reflects that inspiration.”The scallops and curves of the building allow light and shadow to play and interact. The glass facade at street level supports the curvilinear upper section, which makes it seem to float.”

There is a three story visible vault with concave and convex shaped glass walls that rises from the ground floor through the upper floors, and is an open display of over 5,000 Inuit cavings. Visitors will also be able to watch conservators at work through the glass walls.

Maltzan’s visit to the Nunavut made him aware of the scale of the Arctic and he transported that scale to the galleries. Usually the rooms where art is displayed should be similar to the place where the art was created. Often that manifests as small intimate rooms, similar to the confined space of an artist’s studio. The main exhibition gallery at Qaumajug is 8000 sf of space and its sculptural walls soar thirty feet, washed by the light from the many skylights. “”Inuit art is created in a place that is vast and full of light. The scale, the light and the undulating surfaces work as a bridge to the art and the place of its origin.”

Qaumajug’s inaugural exhibition, INUA, meaning ‘life force‘, will feature artists from across Inuit Nunangat, the Inuit homeland in Canada, including some living in the urban south, as well as circumpolar regions like Alaska and Greenland. From digital media and installation art to mixed-media sculpture, painting, and photography, new commissions alongside works drawn from existing collections will span generations of artists. 

For museum lovers, this is one to add to your must-see list, and a new reason the visit Winnipeg. The museum will open to the public with opening ceremonies on March 25, 2021.