Artist Blog

Every week an artist whose single image was published by Der Greif is given a platform in which to blog about contemporary photography.

For my last day of guest blogging, I thought I would take the opportunity to share a few images from the latest project I'm working on. I am currently living in Canada on a Fulbright grant, which allowed me to spend this last winter living in a small town on the north of Baffin Island in the Canadian Arctic. To summarize, my original idea was to be there throughout the full 3 months of winter darkness, during which time I would try to learn as much as possible about people's relationship to the Arctic winter landscape, and make photographs. So, with rather little idea of what awaited me, I flew north on November 1st of last year - five days before the sun set for the winter - and returned to Toronto a month ago, about three weeks after the return of the sun. It is difficult to write about, at this point. The experience was unfathomably rich - I learned more than I ever anticipated I could, and I think it changed me deeply. Yet it is both too recent, and somehow inaccessible, in my mind. I can't see much in the photographs yet aside from my own associations with them, but this is normal. It takes time. Ideally, I would give myself about a year - or at the very least, a few months - to sort of decompress and mentally process the experience, separate myself from the photographs, and then return to them with fresh eyes and a clearer perspective. However, life does not always allow these sort of luxurious timeframes, and to my equal delight and bewilderment, I will be presenting a selection of images in a print exhibition in Ottawa in two and a half weeks! So, ladies and gentlemen, I present to you now several images from UNDER THE SAME STARS, an exhibition exploring the idea that across the international spectrum of the Circumpolar North, we are all tied together by our shared experiences within the Arctic landscape. The show will be on view from April 22nd-24th in downtown Ottawa, and will be the first of several international exhibitions as this project develops further over time. This is all made possible by the Fulbright Canada-RBC Eco-Leadership Program, and presented in affiliation with Fulbright's Arctic Initiative. If you're curious to hear more about my time in the Arctic, you can take a look at this blog post I wrote for Fulbright a few months ago. Well, that's all for now! Thanks to Der Greif for this opportunity, it's been wonderful to take part. Warmest wishes from Toronto!