Fran Hurcomb's What I Saw exhibit shows realness

Fran Hurcomb arrived in Yellowknife in 1975 with a camera and an open mind. An exhibit of her photos, taken over the past four decades, is now on display at the Prince of Wales Northern Heritage Centre.

Hurcomb's 40-year retrospective exhibit is called What I Saw.

And what she saw in the North, especially in 1975 when she arrived, was realness. According to Hurcomb: "There was no artifice. It was down to earth, it was day to day. It was dangerous!"

If Hurcomb was a greenhorn when she got here, she got past that when she started running a dog team. She ran a team for 20 years and fished some 300 days a year to feed her dogs.

Hurcomb's connection to life on Great Slave Lake is palpable in the exhibition.

"When I look at the photos I think there's water in every second photo. Pretty well, water or ice, which says a lot about the country here," she says. 

There was no artifice. It was down to earth, it was day to day. It was dangerous!- Fran Hurcomb

What I Saw features about 80 photos, picked thoughtfully from Hurcomb's 40,000 slides, 10,000 black and white negatives and her "hard drives and hard drives" of digital images. Those numbers don't account for the slides Hurcomb lost.

"The tent that I was keeping them in collapsed one spring and a lot of my negatives got wet," she says with a laugh.

Part of what makes the number of images remarkable is that Hurcomb considers herself shy. Yet she has approached thousands of people to ask the question: can I take your photo?

Hurcomb says that's still difficult.

"It was always hard for me to ask the question. And it's not something I even find any easier today."

Part of the exhibit reads: "Digital comes North." It's a reference to digital photography and Hurcomb's transition away from the use of film. But there's a change in the content of Hurcomb's photos that parallels the switch from film to digital. Northern people and the landscape continue to dominate the images, but development and urbanization become the context. 

In 40 years, Hurcomb has documented a profound transition in life in the North. In those same years, Hurcomb has become rooted in the North. She speaks about the change and seems nostalgic about the realness and simplicity that initially drew her to the place. But she's also quick to explain that the soul of what attracted her to the place is not gone.

"It's the world I got drawn into. It's different now, everything changes, but it's still a fascinating place."

What I Saw will be on display at the Prince of Wales Northern Heritage Centre until September 15.