Yellowknife artist and curator Laura Hodgins is using Newfoundland and Labrador’s Fogo Island as a model as she studies how art could help drive northern economies.
Hodgins is researching how a biennale – an international art festival held every two years, like the Venice Biennale – or an arts prize could benefit the NWT’s economy.
Fogo Island, off Newfoundland’s northeast coast, has used the arts to drive tourism revenue for its communities.
In the words of National Geographic, the arts sector has brought “new life to Fogo’s struggling fishing communities.”
During a recent Fogo Island residency, Hodgins said she learned how the Fogo Island Inn – which has become a hub for the arts locally – “really changed the economy of the island” and made a “deep investment in the local economy.”
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The residency, for young curators, is a partnership between the inn, island charity Shorefast and Fogo Island Arts. Hodgins participated alongside three artists from Europe.
Hodgins also wants to learn how to replicate the residency itself in the North. Seeing Fogo Island operate a residency in a remote location has her “thinking more about how we could bring artist residencies to our remote place and what it could look like,” she said.
Hodgins was inspired by “thoughtful things” the Fogo Island residency did, like picking artists up at the airport with a sandwich, organizing meals, and pairing artists with a local host – in her case, a wood carver who showed her the island and his workshop.
Her mornings were spent doing research, with afternoons hiking or meeting up with other artists.
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“It’s still very early days” for her broader project, Hodgins said, but she likes the idea of the biennale model she is developing.
“I’d love to see this be a circumpolar model that would bring artists from across the global north here and put our art on an international stage,” she said.
“Ideally, the first one would be in 2028, but don’t hold me to that. Mostly, it’s just been really exciting to think about the future of of arts economies here.”
