THE HUNTERS

The Inuit are the human population of the high Arctic. They are the custodians of tradition, living from the hunt in ways that have remained mostly unchanged for at least 45,000 years, when their ancestors first moved North into the Siberian territories. Inuit are finely attuned to their environment and have managed to coexist among some of Nature's harshest conditions. 

The Inuit have more than fifty words to describe the ice. The Sámi of Northern Europe and Siberia have up to one hundred and fifty, some even to describe its "soul". Personalizing the ice may seem odd to the more moderate latitudes, where ice -- and more generally, our relationship to it -- is largely misunderstood as an inanimate element. 

That relationship reflect their close bond and reliance on the ice for everything from survival to travel, even defining their identity.

The Inughuit displayed in these photos belong to a small tribe of about 800 individuals indigenous to the very north of Greenland. ​Greenland is the last place on Earth where dogsleds are foundational to the community by facilitating the hunt over the sea ice. Inughuit dogs are a unique breed which has never mixed with other canines and whose bloodline is the closest known to wolves. With their dependence on dogs and the sea ice for the hunt, these Arctic tribes and their traditions are some of the first in line to suffer from climate transformations. 

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