Introduction
I am a multidisciplinary artist based in the town of Canmore in the Canadian Rocky Mountains. I have maintained an active studio practice for forty years. Over that time, I have had studios in Toronto, San Diego, Banff and Berlin.
When I was seventeen, I embarked on a 16,000 km solo hitch-hiking odyssey and documented my journey in a sketchbook. Since then, my life has continued on a trajectory of travel, adventure and art. In retrospect, I think that my need to travel may have been a consequence of being adopted at birth and untethered from my genetic history. Travel has been a way for me to search for a sense of place in the world.
After my university studies in Toronto and California I spent two years traveling, painting and surfing in Mexico. I gravitated toward adventure activities like surfing or snowboarding as a way to “be” in the world and interact with the natural environment. My art is an attempt to reconcile my encounters in nature with my day-to-day life in contemporary culture.
To support my art habit, I have worked a variety of different jobs such as a pizza maker, steel worker and construction laborer. Within the arts sector, I was employed at the Banff Centre as the sculpture studio technician for a year then for two years as the assistant head of the art studio programs. And, for a long time, I worked as a photo journalist specializing in adventure sports. While working as a photographer, I was fortunate to have had regular assignments from major publications that took me all over the world. All the while, I have continue interpreting and processing my experiences on this planet through art.
