Nick Conbere
An Associate Professor at Emily Carr University, Nick Conbere has exhibited his artwork at venues including the International Print Center New York, Minneapolis Institute of Arts and Hawaii Art Museum. In his creative practice, he investigates landscape, seen through the lens of personal experience and narrative, as a means to consider human/nature relationships. For the past three years, he has researched historical images related to the development of the Columbia River, considering these images in relation to his own direct observations.
Rita Wong
Dr. Rita Wong is an award-winning author and Associate Professor at Emily Carr University of Art and Design, on unceded Coast Salish territories. Her most recent book of poetry, undercurrent, addresses water through personal, cultural and political lenses She also recently co-edited with Dorothy Christian Downstream: Reimagining Water, an interdisciplinary anthology. As a resident of the Sto:lo (Fraser River) watershed who benefits from electricity generated through the dams on the Columbia, Wong considers the relationships that exist across watersheds and what reciprocity entails in such contexts.
John Holmgren
John Holmgren is an Associate Professor of Photography at Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Researching themes of environment, industry, time and memory, Holmgren has photographed dams, including those on the Columbia, for over 10 years. His artwork has been exhibited at the Bronx Art Space, Milwaukee Art Museum and the Photo Center NW in Seattle. When not teaching, he resides near the Columbia in Ellensburg, Washington.
Genevieve Robertson
Genevieve Robertson is a drawing-based interdisciplinary artist with a background in environmental studies. In addition to River Relations, she is presently working on a research-creation project that involves interviewing women who advocate for the health of the Columbia, Fraser, Athabasca and Peace Rivers. Robertson has exhibited her artwork in venues including the Libby Leshgold Gallery (Vancouver), The Pensacola Museum (USA), Or Gallery (Vancouver), Gallery 555 (Toronto), the New Gallery (Calgary) and the James May Gallery (USA). She holds an MFA from Emily Carr University (2016) and a BFA from NSCAD University (2009).
Fred Wah
Fred Wah is Professor Emeritus of English of the University of Calgary and a former Parliamentary Poet Laureate of Canada (2011-2013). Much of Fred Wah’s writing, particularly evidenced by the recent publication of Scree: The Collected Earlier Poems 1962-1991, has had as a focus the geography of southeastern BC. He has spent most of his life in the Kootenay region, and his poetry addresses the physical and social terrain inhabited by the Kootenay and Columbia watersheds, its mountains, forests, rivers, and lakes.
Zoe Kostuchuk
From Flin Flon, Manitoba and Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Zoe Kostuchuk has Cree and Ukrainian roots and a deep love for the environment. Her recent exhibitions include a solo exhibition at the Centre East Gallery in Saskatoon as well as group exhibitions at Emily Carr University. Zoe recently participated in an exchange program and studied abroad at Laguna College of Art and Design in California. She will graduate with a BFA from Emily Carr University in June 2018, majoring in Visual Arts with a focus in printmaking and painting.
Matthew Evenden
Matthew Evenden is a Professor of Geography at the University of British Columbia who studies the environmental history of rivers. His first book, Fish versus Power: An Environmental History of the Fraser River (Cambridge University Press 2004) explained how the damming of the upper Columbia helped to insulate the Fraser from hydro development. His most recent book, Allied Power: Mobilizing Hydro-electricity during Canada's Second World War (University of Toronto Press 2015), situates the damming of the Kootenay River at Brilliant in the context of wartime hydro development across Canada.
Emmy Willis
Emmy Willis creates video documentaries. Her previous project, funded by a grant from the Columbia Basin Trust and the East Kootenay Cultural Alliance, presented a series of four short documentaries about individuals who had forged innovative lifestyles from the region near the headwaters of the Columbia, where Willis was raised. The project was screened at multiple venues in BC’s Kootenay region. Willis has also worked in arts administration at the artist-run centre Western Front and at Vivo Media Arts Centre in Vancouver. She holds a BFA from Emily Carr University.