Milano, Burnaby 2018
Commissioned by Solterra Development Corp.

One of the threads running through our body of work is a meditation on landscape and culture and on positioning ourselves within the world. The work is intended to “change the focus of the eye” (Joseph Campbell, On Being Human) and references the iconic paintings of mountains by Lawren Harris (a long time resident of Vancouver), the connection between landscape and identity.

Set in the pool, resting on concrete plinth, is an over-scaled totemic figure, coyote, at eye level. Coyotes are familiar urban residents, yet evoke a sense of the wild, the unknown. The eye of coyote is caught by something lustrous overhead.

As your eye follows coyote’s gaze, you are drawn to an abstract, intricate form suspended above the entry – the inverted topography of a mountain peak

lightness of being links us to the larger landscape, a timeless one beyond urban confines. There is an implied, undefined, narrative between coyote and mountain, the two connected by a focused gaze. The artwork forms an imaginary landscape – connecting past and present, urban and wild – with you as the figure in the landscape.