hey, I’m em

I was born and raised on Lake of the Woods in Northwestern Ontario. My appreciation of nature comes from the land I grew from and my eye for composition from my mother (as well as one of my favourite film cameras - the Canon EOS 500 she shot my baby photos with in the 90’s). My identity is tied tightly to my upbringing on the lake and my art tied tightly to my identity, hence, I hold my photo work very close to my heart.

My first camera was gifted to me at age 11 (see my first ‘self-portrait' to the left) and I’ve never been without one since. I was always a crafty kid, from hogging the art station at preschool to moving schools in grade 6 so I could attend our town’s only “fine arts” program. I was lucky enough to have access to a darkroom at my high school, which is where my journey with film photography technically began. Shooting film didn’t wow me then like it does now but taking portraits became kind of my thing, although, at the time my friends just called it “taking Instagram photos.”

I fell in love with Vancouver during a summer program at Emily Carr University of Art and Design and moved to the city at 18 when I began my undergraduate degree at the University of British Columbia. I graduated UBC with a Bachelors of Arts, majoring in Social Justice and minoring in Philosophy. During my degree, I returned to Ontario every summer for my seasonal job as a wildfire radio operator but I am now living permanently in British Columbia.

Film photography re-entered my life in December 2019 when I took my one of my mom’s film cameras out one night to document my New Years Eve. Shooting film became my main creative outlet during the pandemic and after about a year of experimentation, Elmshoots (derived from my nickname, Elm) was born on Instagram in January of 2021.