About

A friend said to me lately, about writing, “it is not helpful to be given a gift from the gods and mistake it for our own doing.” Very wise, this friend is. My task as a writer, my vocation even, is to attune my senses to what the gods might be wanting to bestow. Do I know who the gods are? No. But I feel them often, and not often enough.

My family and I live in Yellowknife, a small subarctic city in Northwest Territories, Canada, on Dene land. It is so far away from Art (note the capital A) that I tend to think of it as the art world’s weird, distant cousin. Even though I so rarely get to see it in person, art is what I like to write about most. I enjoy trying to understand why a painting might simmer under its surface, how the invisible is made visible within it. My writing does not occur in an academic vacuum, but in the everyday. The great thinkers of history can elucidate art, but so can the mess on the kitchen table.

During my first years in Yellowknife, my writing was focussed on shining a spotlight on little-known northern artists and on arts advocacy. At the time, Yellowknife did not have a contemporary gallery nor was it properly supported at the municipal or Territorial level. A fun summary of our ‘weird cousin,’ northern art scene can be found here: https://www.cbc.ca/arts/we-turned-a-trailer-into-an-art-gallery-and-drove-it-around-the-n-w-t-1.7288778

A longer, more pointed article about how Yellowknife's geographical remoteness ought to be considered a strength rather than a weakness in the Canadian art world, can be found here: https://maisonneuve.org/article/2022/04/8/different-strokes/

In recent years however, my writing is concerned with the spiritual lives of artists (we need one, if we’re going to survive this age!). It is concerned too with ideas around devastation and ruin, with disenchantment and wonder, symbol and metaphor. See the Selected Essays page for examples, if you’re inclined!

My bylines include Galleries West, CBC arts, Maisonneuve Magazine, Studio Magazine, Macleans’ Magazine, Canadian Art, UpHere Magazine, and more. A few of my essays have won Alberta Magazine Publishing Awards. The Last Great Art Show is a finalist in their upcoming competition.