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Play's the thing to fight teen malaise

Performing arts workshops give Iqaluit youth a chance to be themselves

GREG YOUNGER-LEWIS

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You wouldn't recognize them in the street: Laakkuluk Jessen Williamson, 24, from Maniitsoq, Greenland, Barbara Akoak, 15, from Iqaluit, and Sylvia Cloutier, 28, mug for the camera after their afternoon of Uaajeerneq dancing and acting. (PHOTOS BY GREG YOUNGER-LEWIS)

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Cheeks bulging with jawbreaker candy, Sylvia Cloutier and her clowning partner smeared their entire faces with black makeup, and transformed into lunging, jumping, prowling creatures with a menacing - and sexy - sense of humour.

Cloutier, a 28-year-old throat-singer and dancer in Iqaluit, joined forces earlier this month with Laakkuluk Jessen Williamson, a performance artist from Maniitsoq, Greenland, for the latest in a series of workshops in Iqaluit meant to pique young people's interest in theatre.

On the surface, the two performing artists cajoled their students in the Anglican Parish Hall into having plain, simple fun.

But after their first of three afternoons with kids from around Iqaluit, Cloutier said she sees theatre and other performance arts as the key to fighting social ills in Inuit communities.

"I wish people would understand that this is for their children," Cloutier said. "We could save lives by doing this."

Cloutier explains that by giving young people a way to express themselves, freely and creatively, workshops like the ones she presented July 6-8, will give them confidence they lack from not finding feel-good activities to do. Cloutier notes that she recruited most of her students for the recent workshop by wandering the streets of Iqaluit, where she found eight teens ready to give up boredom for an afternoon of acting.

Theatre won't wipe out the problems youth face, like crime, dropping out of school, violence, and drug and alcohol abuse - but Cloutier is confident it helps.

"Teenagers need things to do," she said. "We're trying to create opportunities so they realize they're too good for that [alcohol and drugs]. . . and they don't have to resort to being bored."

Cloutier hopes the buzz around the clowning and acting workshop with Jessen Williamson will convince Nunavut politicians and bureaucrats to increase funding to the arts.

Nunavut's department of culture, language, elders and youth provided Qaggiq Theatre $25,000 to fund similar workshops over the next year. The government also chipped in $15,000 for Nunavut youth to participate in a program called Tauqsiijiit at the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto.

The program will bring together Inuit youth from Iqaluit, Ottawa, Toronto, and young aboriginal actors from northwest Ontario for a multi-media extravaganza.

Jessen Williamson, the program's artistic director, says Tauqsiijiit will aim to showcase how Inuit and aboriginal youth struggle to find an identity. Tauqsiijiit means "people who exchange objects and ideas."

Jessen Williamson finds youth often feel confused about what it means to be an Inuk because the culture has changed so much in a few generations.

"It's an opportunity for young Inuit to take ownership of their culture," said Jessen Williamson, 24. "As an Inuit youth myself, I want to collaborate with people so we know what Inuit culture is.

"I want people to know that to be yourself is to be Inuit."

Barbara Akoak, 15, from Iqaluit, agreed that young Inuit need artistic outlets to express themselves.

Akoak, who danced like a tiger, bird and monkey at the workshop and later did throat-singing and traditional drumming, said theatre was "something to enjoy with friends."

Asked why she enjoyed the workshop, Akoak replied on cue: "I like it because you can just be yourself."

Tauqsiijiit begins the first week of August, featuring sounds of Nunavummiut fishing, soapstone carvings, a makeshift qarmaq, and Isuma documentaries about Nunavut.

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