Last Friday was a pretty amazing night for me! The Inglewood Fine Arts gallery had its opening reception for the show PULSE, featuring beautiful pieces by Jeff Cruz, Andrew Millar and Royce Howland as well as my latest series Locked-in. It is quite an incredible feeling to see people react to the work without filters, to see their expression when they hear about what happened, to witness their interest about the process of printing VanDyke Browns (“That’s why the edges are so beautiful too! I wondered if they were paintings instead of photographs.”). I felt really privileged to be there and am incredibly grateful that Michel Arseneau curated the work for his show.

Someone asked me “So when did this happen?” referring to my actual locked-in experience. And I realised, it was less than 10 months ago… Not even 10 months!! And SO MUCH has happened since. I wouldn’t have been able to guess that the most frightening moment of my life would have led to this – a whole series exhibited for the first time in an Art gallery in Canada. My work changed – or maybe I just finally let it be. I can’t really explain why, except perhaps with this image that I quite like: seeds need to be buried in darkness in order to sprout and grow.

I want to thank every person who has been by my side on this journey (you know who you are). And I was very grateful to see so many friendly faces at the opening itself!

Here are a few iphone pictures of the show – the work hanging before the place was crowded as well as some people snaps (photos taken by whoever held onto my phone, crowd pictures by Michel and surprise portrait of me by Sebastian Kingsford-Nendsa, middle-school photographer)

Oh and if you’re in Calgary but couldn’t make it to the opening, the exhibit is on till the end of February.