BIO
I was born in Southern Ontario (’78) where I was raised in a small farming community on the shores of Lake Erie. I received my Bachelors of Fine Art from OCAD (’02) in Toronto majoring in Drawing and Painting and am currently working towards my MFA at UWO. My work conveys a tension between vulnerability and aggression, innocence and seduction, and life and death. In my darkly sculptural installations, I use unusual and diverse materials such as unrefined tar, found tree stumps, wood chips, plexiglas, wool, garden sculptures and thermosetting polymer.
I believe that art is a practice through which vital aspects of society and life may be examined, challenged, and renegotiated. My interest in environmental philosophy, nature, time and art comes from a fundamental interest in human beings and in our potential to reevaluate the conditions that determine or influence our sense of self and place on earth.
What we must do is question the ways in which we live with our surroundings, and here, I believe, art has a great potential; it not only encourages critical engagement, but also introduces a sense of responsibility in our engagement that has political as well as social and ethical consequences.