NEW YORK, NY.- Beginning February 5, 2026, Fort Gansevoort will present Shapeshifter, its first exhibition with Pitseolak Qimirpik highlighting the Canadian Inuk artist’s vibrant graphic art and quirky tabletop sculptures. Characterized by energetic combinations of color and patterns, Qimirpik’s expressive drawings of Arctic wildlife and composite animal and human figures embody a playful and irreverent spirit. His complementary small stone carvings marry Western pop culture with traditional Inuit visual motifs.
Fort Gansevoort’s exhibition marks the gallery’s third collaboration with the West Baffin Cooperative in Kinngait (formerly Cape Dorset), Nunavut—an artist collective renowned for its exceptional drawings, carvings, and printmaking. Founded in 1959 to support artmaking as an economic engine for the region, the cooperative is a vital creative hub for acclaimed third and fourth-generation artists. Artwork produced there often celebrates local cultural traditions and folklore, yet the newest generation—including Qimirpik—is forging innovative paths that expand the legacy of this storied community.
A standout voice among contemporary artists, Pitseolak Qimirpik is reshaping expectations surrounding traditional media, narrative figuration, and the position of Inuit cultural production within the global art world. While his work remains connected to the formal influences of earlier generations, his constant experimentation across drawing and sculpture sets him apart. With winking referentiality and a blend of Indigenous and pop cultural signifiers, he reflects contemporary Inuit life from a multivalent perspective.
His embrace of personal expression and reinterpretation of conventional pictorial motifs are redefining how Inuit artists engage with both local and international audiences.
Qimirpik’s relationship to sculpture—rooted in his apprenticeship with his father, the renowned carver Kellypalik Qimirpik—continues to inform his thinking about form and space. Even in his graphic work, the solidity of his subjects echoes the simplified volumes of his carvings.
Shapeshifter will feature never-before-exhibited works on paper including monumental multi-part drawings. The multi-panel works, each titled Mix Media (2025) and created exclusively for this exhibition, represent a significant departure from the artist’s earlier single-sheet compositions. Featuring stylized figures, the Mix Media works are arranged from numerous individual panels that form mosaic-like fields of color and pattern. As Qimirpik invites varied configurations of these components, the works can adapt to different environments according to spatial needs. This malleability underscores the artist’s growing interest in the installation of his artwork—an emerging focus among younger Kinngait artists who are increasingly aware of how their work is being displayed globally and received by an expanding international audience.
Qimirpik’s irreverent stone sculptures further illuminate his hybrid visual vocabulary. In Marge Becoming a Muskox (2025) the artist fuses a classic motif of Inuit carving—Arctic wildlife—with an iconic figure of American pop culture. Carved from serpentine and incised with gestural marks, the plump, shaggy body of a muskox merges with the signature beehive hairdo of Marge Simpson, complete with horns fashioned from caribou-antler. The figure’s awkward, transitional posture heightens the work’s absurdity and humor. Rather than overt satire, Qimirpik employs cultural clichés with a cheeky, playful tone, creating a hybrid form that acknowledges both Indigenous and Americana archetypes while transforming them into something wholly his own. The sculpture exemplifies the experimental spirit that also animates his drawing practice.
As Qimirpik continues to expand the boundaries of graphic art and sculpture within the Kinngait community, his work reflects the evolving identities, narratives, and cultural intersections shaping the contemporary Inuit experience. Fort Gansevoort is proud to present this dynamic exhibition, offering audiences an opportunity to engage with an artist whose dynamic vision bridges tradition and innovation with striking originality.
Pitseolak Qimirpik (b.1986) is an Inuk artist from Kinngait, Canada (formerly Cape Dorset). After apprenticing with his father, the renowned carver Kellypalik Qimirpik, Pitseolak Qimirpik established his own contemporary aesthetic both as a sculptor and a graphic artist. His sculpture practice marries pop culture signifiers, including imagery of iPods and characters from Nintendo and The Simpsons, with traditional carving techniques and motifs. In 2021, he expanded his artmaking practice to include graphic art. In 2024, his work was included in the 15th Gwangju Biennale, in Gwangju, Korea. Qimirpik’s work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at Madrona Gallery, Victoria, Canada; and Feheley Fine Arts, Toronto, Canada. Qimirpik’s work has also been included in group exhibitions at Fort Gansevoort, New York; Steinbrueck Native Gallery, Seattle, WA; The Albers Gallery of Inuit Art, San Francisco, CA; the National Ethnographic Museum, Warsaw, Poland; Gwangju Biennale, Republic of Korea; and Inuit Gallery of Vancouver, Vancouver, Canada. His work is included in permanent collections of the North Dakota Museum of Art, Grand Rapids, ND; Crown-Indigenous Relations & Northern Affairs Canada, Quebec, Canada; TD Gallery of Indigenous Art, Toronto, Canada; and Doris McCarthy Gallery, University of Toronto Scarborough, Toronto, Canada.
