After nanoq: flat out and bluesome: a cultural life of polar bears: displacement as a colonial trope and strategy in contemporary art

[nanoq: flat out and bluesome is a project by Snæbjörnsdóttir/Wilson that began as a survey of displaced taxidermic polar bears in the UK conceived with a view to restoring specific and discrete histories to relics whose purpose had hitherto been generic and symbolic.] Since completion of the project nanoq: flat out and bluesome (2006), the photographic archive from the survey has gone on continuous tour of a host of zoological, maritime and polar museums in northern Europe, including those within the Arctic region itself, such as in Longyearbyen, Svalbard and Tromsø, Norway. One of the prime ambitions of the project is to bring singularity to the remains of specimens whose individual, cultural purpose has been to act as representative for a species – and sometimes, even more generically, its environment. In addition there are those specimens in private hands which function as company mascot, conversation piece and inevitably, hunting trophy.