Wild Suburb is inspired by my life in Western Canada, in a suburb of Calgary, Alberta. Its unique mix of culture and ecology immediately stood out to me when I arrived here twenty years ago, and still fascinates me today, since developing a sense of belonging within this culture and landscape. As a husband, father, artist, teacher, and runner, I'm grateful to live and work here. I mention running because as a daily ritual, it's the thing that connects me most within my suburb to nature. On my route I pass houses, bus stops, a community centre, and enter a public park with hills, bike paths, a creek, picnic tables, baseball diamonds, a golf course, and cemetery. I'm only five minutes from downtown, but I'm running on the edge of the Canadian Wild.
I pass other runners, cyclists, golfers, cross-country skiers, coyotes, bobcats, jackrabbits, and skunks, depending on the season. Birders twice a year with cameras and binoculars, looking at warblers and redstarts, and an occasional snowy owl. If someone tells me there's a coyote in the area, I usually just shrug and say, “…it’s a wild suburb.”
Over the years, prairie grasses, azure blue skies, and other motifs crept into my work. One day, an animal made an appearance. And eventually, something wild. I was thinkings about some of this, when I was invited to give a talk at a conference in Lake Louise. So I decided to make an animal mask and do a performance. I chose the deer as an alter ego that would be welcomed, not feared, but also, understood to be wild. At the end of my talk I revealed the mask, walked down to the water's edge, put it on and began making photographs; selfies, nature shots, and pictures of tourists, who in turn asked if I’d pose for photographs with them. From the conference room window facing the lake, my colleagues watched the scene unfold.
The opportunity to perform at the lake and Victoria Glacier, powerful symbols of untamed nature in Canada, is what galvanized my thinking; the irony and absurdity of placing a camera in the hands of wildlife here. The experience motivated me to go further, as I began staging photographs closer to home in my own neighbourhood as a deer man, knocking on doors, asking for permission to stand in a neighbour’s yard or garden, which would invariably lead to questions or laughter that only fueled the performance ritual.
On July 4, 2023 I published my first performance on Instagram @wildsuburb. The logistics, planning, and conversations that followed were unique compared with other investigations I’ve conducted, as the mask became a vehicle for creative inquiry.
