2023
Charcoal on paper
11” x 11” each

This is the ‘Cycle’ series, consisting of one image, repeated eighteen times.

We’ve all heard about the five stages of grief. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. However, we was tend to think of that as a roadmap, leading from one stage to the next. But that’s not how grieving works.

There are many more stages: fear, crises of faith, apathy. We can revisit these stages multiple times over. And sometimes, we can get stuck. Some enter anger, and never leave it. Some are forever stuck in denial. Forever caught in a cycle.

The title, “No Shade in the Shadow of the Cross” comes from a Sufjan Stevens song of the same title.
I took the title to mean that there is no shade from grief, even within a belief system. No shelter from having to process it. It’s meant to represent a crisis of faith.

Therefore, the structure in the piece is First Baptist Church in Chatham, Ontario. It’s the church I grew up in. The church I just got married in. That my parents got married in. Where we had my mom’s funeral.

Drawing each of these pieces is probably the most tedious thing I’ve ever done. I listened to a lot of podcasts, music, and strangely enough, the movie My Dinner with Andre, just to get through this process. But the end result is my favourite series of drawings in the show.