Pucker Up! The Lipstick Prints of Joyce Wieland is billed as a vignette exhibition, presented in association with a major retrospective of Wieland’s work, Heart On. Celebrating an acquisition that completes the National Gallery of Canada’s collection of Wieland’s so-called lipstick prints, this show is an amuse-bouche in relation to the travelling survey; nevertheless, when considered alongside works by other artists currently on view at the gallery, Pucker Up!’s limited scope still underscores Wieland’s concerns with equity and cultural sovereignty in a manner that resonates with current debates.
Joyce Wieland, The Arctic Belongs to Itself, 1973, lithograph on wove paper (© National Gallery of Canada; photo: NGC)
I recalled Wieland on the same visit while viewing the New Generation Photography Award exhibition where I encountered the work of asinnajaq, a Canadian Inuk artist from Inukjuak, Quebec. Featuring details of nature and terrain, her prints, unframed and affixed to the wall with magnets, or on a piece of synthetic fabric bunched up in the centre of space, reminded me of the provisional and performative aspects I discerned in Wieland’s work. Through artworks like The Arctic Belongs to Itself (included in Pucker Up!), Wieland raised awareness about Indigenous rights and the threat of environmental devastation. In accordance with Inuit values, asinnajaq similarly expresses a love of the land. Her video holding piece, like Weiland's work, suggests that an act of loving care can also be an act of resistance. The complete text of my review of the exhibition was published here on the May 29 Akimblog.
