Joshua Tree is a single-shot, minimalist experimental film about time, consciousness, and climate change. It is about the experience of time, the movement of time, and the growing sense of being-out-of-time. It is also about a rhythm between waking consciousness and dreaming, where surreal and mystical experiences occur. Further, it is building off of evolving themes of the Anthropocene by directly witnessing landscapes at risk of annihilation, acting as an archive, a memorial. It examines a contribution art could have on shifting and attuning human understanding to something so massive and distributed across time as climate change—that stars no one, that is long in the making, and attritional. All of these ideas were in play when making this work.
Avatar's Dream is a meditation on an old-growth forest on Vancouver Island called Avatar Grove. It is currently at threat from logging and has sparked a resistance called the Fairy Creek Blockade. When I sit and meditate in this forest, I imagine the network of Red Cedar and Hemlock roots weaving and knotting with mycelium exchanging nutrients and knowledge. I once read forests dream, and as I meditate, I wonder if I can dream with the forest and if we can fall into each other's dreams: because sometimes falling is easier than resisting. Does this forest dream of its birth or death, the fullness of life or coming epochs of deserts? Is it aware of the Joshua Trees 2,482 km south? Does it have nightmares of axes and trucks? Does it sense the activists chaining themselves to its roots? Do these thousand-year-old Bodhisattva’s even perceive all the frenetic activity of us humans? Or does this forest rest and recoil into the soil, slipping into the dreams of the mycelial network waiting for a new epoch?
These films were part of an original dance performance with Brain Webb Dance Company.
Film Screenings
2021 Vancouver Independent Film Festival. Vancouver, BC, Canada (Finalist: Best animated film)
2020 Oregon Short Film Festival. The Dalles, OR, USA (Finalist: Best Experimental Film)
2020 South Film and Arts Academy Festival. Rancagua, Chile (Best Art Video)
2020 The Short Film Filmmaker Showcase. Pinewood Studios, UK
2020 Hollywood Gold Awards. Hollywood, CA, USA (Award Finalist)
2020 New York Animation Film Awards. New York City, NY, USA (Semi-Finalist)
2020 Dumbo Film Festival. New York City, NY, USA (Semi-Finalist)
2020 Venice Film Awards. Venice, Italy (Award Finalist)
2020 ARTsPLACE. Annapolis Royal, NS, Canada
2020 Paris Play Film Festival. Paris, France
2020 New Indie Film Festival of London. London, UK
2020 Twin Rivers Media Festival: Experimental. Asheville, NC, USA
2020 New York Movie Awards. New York City, NY, USA (Award Winner: Experimental Film)
2020 International Festival of Winter Cinema. Edmonton, AB, Canada
2020 New York Movie Awards. New York City, NY, USA (Award Winner: Experimental Film)
Dance
2020-21 Collaboration on an original dance performance with Brian Webb Dance Company
Exhibitions
2023 And All of Everything. Hartcourt House. Edmonton, AB (Solo)
2022 And All of Everything. Art Gallery of St. Albert. St. Albert, AB (Solo)
2021 Perspectives from Within. Contemporary Calgary. Calgary, AB
2020 What Makes Us Human? Art + Genomics. Mary Porter Sensnon Art Gallery. Santa Cruz, CA
2020 Creative Code Festival. Lightbox. New York City, NY
2020 Dyscorpia 2.1.
2020 Beyond Here Lies Nothing. ARTsPLACE. Annapolis Royal, NS (Solo)
2020 Telling Stories Otherwise. Alberta Printmakers. Calgary, AB (Solo)
2019 Practicing Engagement. SLSA. Irvine, CA
2019 Processor. Art Gallery of Alberta. Edmonton, AB