I’m a multidisciplinary artist and academic exploring themes of alienation and belonging through our everyday relationships with natural and built environments. My artistic practice is committed to the democratic and accessible ideals of photography. I believe that work that overemphasizes traditional beauty, especially those works that elevate the most extreme versions of beauty that our overstimulated, consumerist culture demands, create a paradigm in which art cannot inform the everyday, it can only let us down. Instead, I’m concerned with the ways that art informs our appreciation of everyday beauty and fundamentally elevates our existence through an ability to appreciate the banal as well as provide a greater theoretical understanding of the world around us.
I also hold a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Guelph. My research specializes in philosophy of art, aesthetics, biology, evolution, and culture, incorporating empirical and interdisciplinary approaches through data analysis and digital humanities. I am interested in the evolution of art as a social and cultural practice as well as empirical approaches to philosophical questions. In my work, I make use of cross-cultural, phylogenetic, statistical, and machine-learning approaches. As an artist, I’m also deeply concerned with the limits of reductionism as it relates to empirical approaches to aesthetics.
I’m committed to the importance of my work as both an artist and academic. This includes exploring the various intersections of art and philosophy, such as the ways philosophical questions are raised in art as well as the ways questions about art are raised in philosophy. I believe that art and philosophy are both powerful ways of knowing.
My artistic work has been exhibited in group and solo shows, including through the Alberta Society of Artists, The New Gallery, Toronto Metropolitan University, the Exposure Photography Festival, Alberta Views Magazine, and The Calgary Herald. My work has also been generously funded by the Alberta Foundation for the Arts and Calgary Arts Development.
My philosophical work has been published in peer-reviewed journals, presented at conferences, and has been generously funded by a number of groups including The University of Calgary, The University of Guelph, and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC).
Currently, I serve on the boards of the Exposure Photography Festival and TRUCK Contemporary Art, and I’m working on several projects, including Nowhere, a photographic exploration of trauma and memory in my hometown of Drumheller, Alberta. This work is generously funded by the Alberta Foundation for the Arts and Calgary Arts Development and will be shown for the first time at Platform Centre for Photographic & Digital Arts in January 2027.
