“The important thing is not to think much, but to love much, and so to do whatever best awakens you to love.” – Theresa of Ávila.

I grew up believing I didn’t belong – feeling alone, disconnected, cut off. My approach to photography is to strive to find the opposite, connection.

Just walking with a camera at my side, with no thought of raising it to take a picture, was to feel part of the world instead of apart. I could walk for hours, searching, scanning, watching, waiting. Then, turning a corner, came the aha moment - the joy of recognizing that someone or some scene would make a meaningful photograph.

I started as a street photographer, seeking to capture people unawares in moments of unselfconscious authenticity. More recently I’ve begun to work openly with subjects in the places where I find them. These encounters, captured in my ongoing series, Visitors, can be alchemic. The more genuine my interest in someone, the more real, even vulnerable the connection and the better the image. My favourite photographs of these meetings are as much portraits of connection as of individuals. Through the encounters documented in this series I advocate for the power and importance – especially in this fractious virtual age – of truly seeing each other.

Theatre of War, 2014 to 2018, my first foray into environmental portraiture, was more intellectual in scope. Why, I wondered, do we have an urge to play … at war? I explored the popular mock-warfare game of paintball through player portraits and photographs of field structures. Uniforms, weapons and buildings are splattered with exploded ammunition, and everything in the game is designed to capture a grim battlefield verisimilitude. We are left to wonder about this blurring of distinction between war and recreation.

Gathering Place is an ongoing series that examines our need for physical connection with nature as well as with each other at a time of environmental decline and virtual relationships. These photos have been taken over a number of years at a local fast-food restaurant on the shore of the Gatineau River, close to Ottawa, Canada. The property is mostly paved, often littered and denuded of vegetation. The view, however, is of largely unspoiled wilderness, the river pouring pristinely out of the north. In the warmer weather people come and linger and I take pictures: parents with children, friends gathering, couples showing affection, bikers stopping for a coffee and a smoke, employees at the drive-thru window. This series unites my conceptual and environmental interests with my approach to street photography.

In general, my photographic practice explores what it means to feel connected. I strive to capture moments that speak to the things that bring us together and allow us to consider what might drive people apart. I feel my images are most successful when the moments I’ve recorded open viewers to these questions.

CV

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2022 Mexico – a year-long exhibition of street photography, Catrina Churros, Ottawa

2018 Framing the Interior – year-long exhibition of street photography, Fraser Café, Ottawa

GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2017 Salon 44 – juried exhibition of image-based work by members, Gallery 44 Centre For Contemporary Photography, Toronto

2016 Salon 44 – juried exhibition of image-based work by members, Gallery 44 Centre For Contemporary Photography, Toronto

365 – juried exhibition of image-based work by members, Gallery 44 Centre For Contemporary Photography, Toront

Dark Room 5.0 – annual juried exhibition of analog photography, 918 Bathurst Centre, Toronto

Island. Resident. – curated exhibition of photographs from photography residency led by April Hickox at Artscape Gibralter Point, 2015, Toronto

2015 Photopia – exhibition of image-based work by G44 members – part of Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival, Toronto

          Dark Room 4.0 – annual juried exhibition of analog photography, 918 Bathurst Centre, Toronto

Framing the Interior, Workshop Gallery – part of Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival, Toronto

2014   Photopia – exhibition of image-based work by G44 members – part of Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival

2013   Photopia – exhibition of image-based work by G44 members – part of Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival

AWARDS

Best Figurative, Dark Room 4.0, a juried group exhibition of analog photography at the 2015 Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival, 918 Bathurst Centre for Culture, Arts, Media, and Education

RESIDENCIES

2015 Artscape Gibraltar Point, led by April Hickox

2014 Artscape Gibraltar Point, led by April Hickox

EDUCATION

2014-2024 Coaching and mentoring: Siân Davey, Lyla Rye, Meera Margaret Singh

2012-2019    Various workshops and courses at the Gallery 44 Centre for Contemporary Photography and the School of Photographic Arts of Ottawa

2015-2019 Private instruction in darkroom practices with various photographers

2011 Ryerson University, Digital Capture 101

MEMBERSHIP

Gallery 44 Centre for Contemporary Photography, a non-profit artist-run centre