In connection with the exhibition In Praise of the Missing Image, co-presented by the MAC and MOMENTA as part of the 19th edition of the Biennale, we invite you to a visit of the mural River Water with artist Niap.
Mural Walkthrough: River Water
With artist Niap
This mural walkthrough will be held in French on Wednesday, September 24, at 5:30 p.m. and will last 60 minutes.
We encourage you to book in advance as space is limited.
Niap
Niap, also known as Nancy Saunders, is an Inuk artist from Kuujjuak, Nunavik. In her multidisciplinary practice—drawing, painting, sculpture, performance—she explores identity, cultural transmission, and representations of her home community’s northern territory. Combining Inuit traditions with contemporary practices, she both preserves and reimagines her ancestors’ heritage. Her attentive, sensitive gaze shows us landscapes that are not easily accessible and affirms her belonging to these territories.
For the series River Water, Niap created abstract watercolour landscape paintings using water from different rivers in Nunavik, gathered during family outings. She found that colours are more saturated, brighter, with this water than with tap water. On the paper, the water guides the pigments’ path, becoming a full collaborator in the process, so that the horizons portrayed also give the sense of rivers seen from the air. Here, land and sea find unusual formal kinship through the fluid’s motion. Each work bears the trace of its origin and is rooted in Niap’s personal history. Reproduced as a mural, the series becomes a gesture of appropriation of the land and the medium—a powerful affirmation of Kuujjuaq culture and a living bond uniting Inuit communities with their environment. The mural will be exhibited in the corridor adjacent to the MAC, at Place Ville Marie.
