Vision, mission & logo

Mission

Greenland National Museum & Archives research and disseminate cultural history and develop the prerequisites of knowledge acquisition for the continued development of Inuit and Greenlandic historical consciousness and cultural heritage.

Vision

Our vision is to be a living, proactive museum and archive that generates knowledge-based understanding, interpretations and connections between the past, the present and the future.

Logo

Our logo is inspired by the leather embroidery on a skin pouch from Ammassalik. The pouch is part of our permanent exhibition, and according to the museum register is a sewing pouch from around 1900.

The logo has been used by the museum and archives since 1978.

In 1914 ethnographer William Thalbitzer described the skin ornamentation of east Greenland as ’eye-like’. There are similar examples from Siberia and Alaska. The Yupik of Alaska use the symbol in dance masks and call it ellam iingaa  - the eye of consciousness. This can be compared with the Greenlandic Sila, which also means awareness and consciousness of the world.

The different uses of the logo by Greenland National Museum & Archives over the years tells us something about the development of the museum and Greenlandic society. In 1978 explanations of the logo emphasised its roots in the Inuit cultural community. In the explanatory text from 1990 the meaning of the logo became part of the museum’s image as an institution of knowledge and research. Here the emphasis was on the meaning of the symbol as an interpretation of Sila, i.e. ‘carefulness’ and ‘reason’.