Film Screening: Historjá – Stygn för Sápmi

Join ASI for a special film screening to mark Sámi National Day and celebrate the opening of Arctic Highways: Unbounded Indigenous People.

The artist Britta Marakatt-Labba evokes the history and mythology of the Sami people like no other.

Britta Marakatt-Labba has for decades created images from Sami history and mythology using only needle and thread. A few years ago, she created a big sensation at Documenta in Kassel, one of the international art scene’s most influential platforms. The 24 meter long embroidered work “Historjá” left the audience in tears and overnight Britta Marakatt-Labba became one of Sweden’s most sought after artists. In the spring of 2022, she was also selected for the Venice Biennale’s main exhibition.

With small stitches, Britta Marakatt-Labba evokes the history and mythology of the Sámi people, from cosmology and the act of creation of the mother goddess to displacement, colonialism, state-supported racism and political battles. After several decades on the barricades for her people’s rights, with her art as a weapon, she and the Sámi are now facing their biggest challenge yet: Climate change. Climate change is an existential issue for the Sámi culture because they are completely dependent on the arctic climate for their survival.