Photo: © Nahanni McKay
Reneltta Arluk is Inuvialuk, Dene, and Cree from the Northwest Territories. Raised by her grandparents on the trapline until school-age, Reneltta’s early nomadic life provided her with the unique skills needed to become the multi-disciplined nomadic performing artist she is today. Through this lived experience and artistic training, Reneltta has acquired the specialized cultural protocol awarenesses and artistic Indigenous lens in which she works from.
As the Director of Indigenous Arts at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, Reneltta was responsible for the vision to design Indigenous-led Arts programming across all artistic disciplines and to offer support for inclusionary programming for Indigenous artists campus-wide. She was also responsible for developing and strengthening relationships with Treaty 6 Indigenous community members, and forging partnerships with non-Indigenous artistic institutions regionally, nationally and globally, all with the intention of creating space for Indigenous voices.
Reneltta holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Acting from the University of Alberta, where she became the first Indigenous woman and first Inuk to graduate from the reputable program. For over 20 years, Reneltta has been part of or initiated the creation of Indigenous theatre across Canada and overseas. In 2008, she founded Akpik Theatre, the only professional Indigenous theatre company in the Northwest Territories. Adhering to its namesake, the cloudberry, Akpik Theatre strives to flourish in the northern climate it reflects by developing, mentoring and producing performance-based work that is northern-Indigenous inspired and created. Reneltta is also the first Inuk and Indigenous woman to direct at the Stratford Festival, where she received the Festival’s 2017 Tyrone Guthrie—Derek F. Mitchell Artistic Director’s Award for directing The Breathing Hole by playwright Colleen Murphy.
Reneltta advocates for cultural change in Canada as an artist, board member and arts administrator. She extends that stewardship internationally as an arts leader utilizing inherent Indigenous value systems.
