There have been many firsts at the Venice Biennale in recent years, but Denmark’s pavilion brings two at once. It is the first time the country has chosen a photographer to represent it at the event, and the first time it has dedicated its pavilion to the work of an artist from Greenland, the now autonomous territory it controlled for more than two centuries.
The artist is Innuteq Storch, who captures snapshot-like images of his community while bringing to the fore work by Greenlanders from more than a century ago. His mission, he says, is to represent Greenlandic identity from a Greenlander’s perspective, and “subtly and intricately modify the prevailing perception” of his country.
The Venice show, Rise of the Sunken Sun, juxtaposes work from a number of previous projects, including Mirrored, featuring images by Greenland’s first professional photographer, John Møller, from the turn of the 20th century. A new series, Soon Will Summer be Over, documents the domestic remnants of colonialism in Qaanaaq, north Greenland, as well as the impact of the climate crisis on daily life. The show seeks to capture his sense of “intimacy and community”, as well as his very “emotional, bodily” relationship with archives, says Louise Wolthers, the pavilion’s curator.
Subtle cultural and political references pervade the show: for example, over the pavilion’s façade Storch has placed the words “Kalaallit Nunaat”—the Greenlandic term for Greenland—in Plexiglass.
Such playful politicism feels fitting for a Biennale itself wrapped up in colonial history. For Wolthers, the show offers an opportunity to put northern Indigenous identity on the international stage. But it is also a reminder that Storch is part of different conversations too. “I think he is part of a generation of younger artists for whom, even though the colonial past is still present and posing many challenges, there are so many other things going on.”