Update: Minutes after publishing, Tanya Tagaq has confirmed on Twitter that her music is "being removed from that lowbrow film and will never appear in it again."
I'm thrilled to report that my music is being removed from that lowbrow film and will never appear in it again.
— tanya tagaq (@tagaq) November 26, 2015
Quebec filmmaker Dominic Gagnon's video collage of the North spins a painful vision of Northern living. Cobbled from 500 hours of YouTube and other publicly available footage uploaded by amateur Inuit filmmakers, the 74-minute mash-up collects images of hunting, family life, and industrial development in the North, alongside clips of drunken Inuit men wrestling, crashing a four-wheeler and vomiting.
"I think it's kind of a cheap move to totally play up a negative stereotype of a marginalized people for your own artistic gain," Alethea Arnaquq-Baril, an Inuk documentary maker, told CBC. "He's never been north, he's admitted that, and he's got no stake in our communities, in our reputation."
Acclaimed artist Tanya Tagaq — whose music, along with the work of numerous other Inuit musicians, was used without permission — told CBC that Gagnon's damaging representation won't ignite social debate, and fails to recognize the vibrancy and tremendous forward movement of northern communities.
Tagaq has threatened legal action if the director doesn't remove her voice tracks from of the North — a film which seemingly stands in opposition to Tagaq's values and politics.
The documentary has already enjoyed success on the festival circuit, showing in Prizren and Leeds. It won a jury award at the Visions du Réel festival in Nyon, Switzerland. of the North screened twice last week as part of RIDM (the Montreal International Documentary Festival). Tagaq raised her concerns on Twitter (culminating with a congratulations for pulling the film, though no official comment has been made).
.@RIDM chose to show a painful and racist film that uses my music without consent. I did not give permission to the filmmaker.
— tanya tagaq (@tagaq) November 25, 2015
.@RIDM he also used @iskell music without permission. Using our music to stigmatize and discredit our culture. I'm disgusted.
— tanya tagaq (@tagaq) November 25, 2015
Given the state of #MMIW in our country, WHY would such a one sided and disparaging account of Inuit life be approved by @RIDM? Low.
— tanya tagaq (@tagaq) November 25, 2015
Stereotypical content and infringement of copyright does not mean "art", it merely exacerbates debilitating opinions and promotes violence.
— tanya tagaq (@tagaq) November 25, 2015
.@Alethea_Aggiuq @iskell I have a cease and desist form available for anyone whose music appeared without permission. Contact @SixShooterR
— tanya tagaq (@tagaq) November 25, 2015
BRAVO! Quebec film fest pulls racist film from their roster. https://t.co/mPPgXLZah4 thank you for respecting our culture!
— tanya tagaq (@tagaq) November 25, 2015
Gagnon defends of the North, telling CBC that the people in the video might be regarded as a sort of "cultural avant-garde."
"They are defiant. They are not following the path that some people would like them to follow, and I feel like I had the right to represent that as well. Not only the politically correct idea or image of the Inuit, but the jackasses and the drunks and the whatever."
And despite comments like that, the outrage has surprised Gagnon. “I made this film with love,” he told an APTN reporter. “Now I am being bashed because I am a man and I am white. I am only a young man who lives on his own, in his own studio, and I don’t see where the privilege comes.”
Tanya Tagaq gets her music removed from “painful and racist” film of the North by chris hampton | Chart Attack.