Iqaluit artist’s work featured on tissue boxes across Canada

Iqaluit artist Yurak is bringing a piece of Nunavut into homes across Canada through Royale’s new limited-edition Canadian Artist Collection. 

Yurak is one of five Canadian artists featured in the collection, which asked artists to answer a simple question: what does home look like to you?

For Yurak, the answer comes through two digital landscape pieces, Brilliance Beyond the Horizon and Tuktuliaq, both inspired by personal experiences in Nunavut.

Brilliance Beyond the Horizon depicts the view from Yurak’s window in Iqaluit, capturing the land at sunrise. The piece looks beyond the familiar image of a snowy northern landscape to highlight the strength, love and bright future Yurak sees in Nunavut and its people. 

Tuktuliaq depicts the quiet landscape just before Yurak caught their first caribou, reflecting on the importance of harvesting from the land and the traditions that connect people to it.

“I really wanted to show the importance of subsistence hunting for my culture, and then the colourful aspirations that Nunavut has as a people,” said Yurak.

Yurak said the collections also gave them an opportunity to challenge stereotypical ideas of Inuit art and the North. 

“I was just trying to uplift Inuit and uplift Nunavut and give them a little spotlight of just how much great work they do,” Yurak said in reference to Nunavut’s contributions to Canadian culture and the arts.

A multidisciplinary artist based in Iqaluit, Yurak’s work celebrates life, Indigenous cultures and community through colourful and personal artwork.

The limited-edition collection launched across Canada this month, with Yurak’s artwork now appearing on Royale tissue boxes.

“Seeing a Canadian company showcasing an artist from Nunavut and our land is really important,” they said.

The other tissue boxes feature artwork from Nova Scotia, Quebec, Ontario and British Columbia.