As a queer child in Southern Alberta, a religious and farming centered community, the lifestyle, politics, and education of my immediate community never resonated and my interests seldomly matched the resources accessible in my environment. Initially, sport was the most direct route to begin my exploration into alternative communities. As an elite-level gymnast and later an NCAA basketball player, the foundations of sport and the value of deep practice to achieve successful performance deeply shaped my approach to entering new communities and learning new skill sets. My path thus far has been driven by part instinct, part intuition, but always rooted in the curiosity to learn more and impact my community.

Moving to Vancouver on a NCAA athletic scholarship at Simon Fraser University exposed me to a city with new professional landscapes. While finishing my undergraduate degree in finance, I was introduced to the world of contemporary art and performance and redirected my post-graduation plans, immediately enrolling in a contemporary dance professional training program called Modus Operandi (MO). I had an inherent pull into a world that centered questioning perspectives, debating subjectivity, shaping perception, abstracting commentary, and celebrating queerness. Throughout my first year in the contemporary dance community, I experienced a change in mindset, rather than motivating “training” by expecting results, leaning into “process” motivating intentional exploration.

While accepting a position as a full-company member for one of Canada’s leading dance companies, I co-founded Boombox, a 53’ x 9’ x 9’ out-of-service semi-truck trailer renovated into an underground rehearsal and performance space. Our goal with Boombox was to provide a fully subsidized rehearsal and production venue centering emerging and marginalized artists with intergenerational curation, and facilitate community building among different performance disciplines. This initial six month project, extended to six years of artist productions, contemporary arts festivals, and residency programs focused on supporting the ideation phase of the creative process. Boombox became a cornerstone for Vancouver’s contemporary performing art scene, hosting over fifty national and international artists. 

During the pandemic closures, everything in the performing arts world came to a halt and digital performance became the primary avenue for performing artists to continue working. Knowing I not only wanted to explore the digital realm of creativity, but also understand it, I enrolled in Northeastern’s Masters in Computer Science Align program. 

To my surprise, the pieces I love about working as an artist, the challenge of building tangibility from an idea, the rigor of iteration, and the collaboration across disciplines, are paralleled in software development. The further I progressed in my graduate studies, the stronger my passion grew for pursuing intersectional work centering physicality, artistry, and technology.

In January 2022, I joined Unity Technologies developing video-to-animation and audio-to-animation data pipelines for machine learning tools targeting the games and film industry. Throughout my journey thus far, I have learned an immense amount about how art and technology have the capacity to empower one another, and I am incredibly excited by the opportunity to continue my intersectional pursuits at the MIT Media Lab.