2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics Organizing Committee Awards Merchandising License To Tribal Group

Vancouver, Canada (AHN)-- More than a thousand Inuit hand carvers have been commissioned to create inukshuks and other aboriginal handmade art work for the 2010 Winter Olympics.

The Vancouver Organizing Committee on Wednesday signed a licensing agreement giving the Four Host First Nations and Nunavut Development Corp. rights to market merchandise with aboriginal themes under the Olympic brand.

Four kinds of products - aboriginal art, products featuring the logo of the Four Host First Nations, British Columbia's Lil'wat, Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh bands who cooperated in the Olympic bid; the integration of aboriginal graphics into Olympic merchandise,and a range of other items featuring aboriginal themes and icons are included in the licensing agreement.

Among the top products in the line up is 2101 Games logo - the Ilanaaq - a colorful, stylized version of an inukshuk, an Inuit rock marker.

Indigenous artists from Nunavut have agreed to deliver 3,000 hand-carved inukshuks. The unique pieces of Inuit art will be sold for $65 to $400, and the aborigines are sure to get a fair price.

Vanoc CEO John Furlong says the deal presents aboriginal artists with a market keen for their work, and could help protect them from cheap knockoffs made overseas, as the products will be identified as official Vancouver 2010 merchandise.

He added that a third of the royalties will fund cultural, educational and sporting opportunities for native youth.

The 2010 Olympics are in Vancouver and Whistler, B.C., from Feb. 12-28, 2010, followed by the Paralympic Winter Games from March 12-21.