After art school (New School in Toronto) I lived the stereo-typical struggling artist’s life, working mostly mundane and often miserable jobs. As time went on I found art related work like graphics, illustration and set painting. At one point I landed a job at the University of Toronto’s media unit in the Faculty of Medicine; I was in on the early days of computer graphics working on a monster of a Genigraphics computer. It cost a quarter of a million dollars, took up the space of a small room, and had a good six month learning curve; now kids can do that kind of work from a smart phone, never mind a laptop. I also managed a few plum commissions in my thirties (including a rather ill fated sculpture project) and even had representation by a Yorkville gallery (Nancy Poole Studio), so by all standards I was relatively successful. But you could have fooled me! Life is hard. Besides, I like to explore and learn new things, so I changed course a little and there are a few years where I was otherwise occupied.

Now I’m continuing to explore, imagery and concepts this time around, so a brand is out of the question. A failing likely in this day and age, but I’m old enough now I don’t really care. There are other more pressing concerns for people like the climate crisis, ongoing and even increasing pollution accompanied by deregulation in some cases, loss of biodiversity, and the sixth great extinction. I have a certain amount of training in the sciences about these things, a PhD with research that examined soil and atmospheric gas exchange and I worked in an environmental lab for several years that specialized in analyzing contaminants. Mostly I’ve been telling anybody who asks and who thinks I might know something, that the fix is in and they might just want to save their own souls. Take a boo at mortality and find some peace, because unfortunately we are all too human and seem to be incapable of the deep changes that need to be made. Those with the most power seem the most incapable.

bubbykettlewell@gmail.com
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