I am burning the midnight oil getting my solo show ready to install next weekend. It will open on Wednesday May 4 and run through Saturday May 21, 2022, at The Red Head Gallery in downtown Toronto.

The title Burnt Offerings alludes to the ancient ritual of burning things whether as offering or sacrifice, as purification or as prayer.
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The concept for the show grew out of experiencing the loss of my father last year, grieving him and contemplating what we feel, and do to mourn, what we lose when we lose a loved one, how loss is the flip side of love, and how it ties into the larger cycles of life and death. Fire and ash are part of that cycle.

This show is both deeply personal and widely relatable, and I hope I am making it more poetic than heavy, so that it will touch you and cause you to reflect and also surprise you in various ways.

For the first time I will be documenting my show in a virtual 3-D format that will allow people unable to visit in person to have a more visit-like experience online. More on that later.

For the second time I am putting out a call for support, for people who love what I do or how I do it and are in a position to provide financial sponsorship, starting at only $10! I will create a separate post about that and link it here when it's ready.

Regardless of that, and in whatever way, I hope you will pay the show a visit, and send me your comments and questions too.

Please wish me luck as I work through the home stretch, when it becomes a matter of stamina really. 

​I can't wait to share this new work with you!

Burnt Offerings is part of the 2022 Scotiabank Contact Photography Festival.

You are invited to my first solo show at The Red Head Gallery, where I became a member in 2018.
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For more information about the content of the show, click here to see the exhibition page.

This show would be less than I’d hoped if not for the generous support of its/my sponsors.
Many thanks to all of the individuals, and one organization, who chose to support this project!

If you are curious about sponsoring new work, in any amount starting at just $10, please visit this page (click here) to find out more.

 

It’s always nice to hear that someone saw my work and both liked it enough and was in a position to purchase it so they could take it home.

“Untitled (Layered Trees)” is one of two artworks sold recently at the Take 2 exhibition at Neilson Park Creative Centre, which has its closing reception this Sunday, 2–4pm. Click here for more details. (On a sidenote, the reception is also an early-bird opportunity to register in-person for spring courses!)

This photo-based mixed media piece is 8” x 8”, on a wood panel, and layers a mounted photo-digital print under an image transfer from a piece of film that I spent considerable time altering by hand before applying.

Trees are a recurring motif in my work now that began to appear regularly once I started my anatomical hearts body of work, because the tree branches are so beautifully analogous to the branching behaviour of veins and arteries. As so often happens, our inner world reflects the outer one, because branching behaviour is a fundamental design structure in nature; it's one that I have become enchanted by. 

I am drawn to the relationship between branches but also to the complexity, which reflects what I experience so often in my own mind and out in the world as I navigate a profusion of sensory inputs and relational ones as well. Complexity can become overwhelming, which some artists (eg Julie Mehretu) communicate (and create) very well.

It's interesting then that for this piece I chose to concentrate on editing the complexity, leaving only small touches of it in deliberate places.

Well that’s all very nice, but none of what I said really addresses the slightly tongue-in-cheek headline I gave this post! 

That headline is rooted in my realization this year that it sometimes isn't clear that my work is almost always available for sale. Some of the more unusual formats might require a little adaptation or customization for a new, permanent home, but most of my work transfers quite easily. 

It’s also true that sometimes when I’ve made a lot of new work for a show or event (like a festival) I’ve worked so hard right up until the installation that I haven't had a chance to work out pricing in time for the opening. So that can be another issue, but it’s only a temporary one :-) 

I’ve had enough people ask that I thought I should clear that up! 

​(Continues below...)

Instead of writing more in this second blog post about my installation at the In Situ 2018 festival, (to see part one click here), I will speak to you via the video below, shot and edited by my charming colleague photographer/videographer Nettie Seip, to whom I owe many thanks!

You'll see me on-site in the room during the early stages of installation as I talk about the work and my intentions for it. Then you get to tour through it at night with it fully installed while the festival was in progress.

​Please take a look and let me know what you think! 

Perhaps after the holidays I will put together some time-lapse video shot over the three nights I spent drawing the Hearts in Place mural in front of the festival audience. I will upload it to my YouTube channel – please click on the link and if you like it, consider subscribing :-)