are.na
A Latest Trails
- Kozo processing and washi papermaking in Ino, Japan
- Material animations & titles design for upcoming feature documentary film by Sybilla Patrizia, with Nik Arthur
- Art direction for upcoming experimental short film by Nik Arthur
- Visual identity for re:arc institute, with Michelle Kuan
B Select Clients
Arc'teryx, GANNI, Houndstooth Label, Inter/Access, Northwestern University, Ploeg Arts, re:arc institute, Tyler McGillivary, University of Toronto
C Collaborators
Nik Arthur, Eric Francisco, Elena Kirby & Masumi Rodriguez, Michelle Kuan, Hinako Omori, Rebecca Wilkinson
2018
Royal Danish Academy, Visual Communication
2023
2022
2021
2021
2020
2020
2019
Rhode Island School of Design, Typography Elective
Cyanotype Workshop, EQ Bank
Variable Axes & Superglyph, Collisions Workshop, studio basic
Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK), Visual Communication, Offshore Studio
OCAD University, Graphic Design Workshop
Launchpad SUMMIT, Frontier Panel Discussion & Workshop, Artscape Daniels Launchpad
OCAD University, Graphic Design Workshop
It's Nice That
The Malee Scholarship (Sharp Type)
TYPEONE Magazine Issue 06
The Pangram Paper (Pangram Pangram) 1
The Pangram Paper (Pangram Pangram) 2
Grilli Type
2022
2021
2021
2021
2020
2020
2019
2019
2018
2018
2016
Ontario Arts Council, Artist-Presenter Collab. Projects
Toronto Arts Council, Creative Communities Grant
Canada Council for the Arts, Digital Now
The Malee Scholarship, Women of Typographic Excellence
OCAD University Medal in Graphic Design
Nora E. Vaughan Award
RGD Awards, Typography, Honourable Mention
ADCC Student Competition, Graphic Design, Silver Winner
Mariah’s Fund Scholarship
Joubin-Selig Bursary
Jan van Kampen Scholarship
Last Updated 26.03.05
Tunnel Mound Comeback
2025
- Art & Installation
- Papermaking
- Exhibition Design
- Booklet Design
- Poster Design
Tunnel Mound Comeback showcases work that stems from “invasive” plant species. Each artist addresses a form of relationship towards the plant material they work with. We place quotation marks on the word “invasive” as a way for us to leave room to think about how this word informs our relationship to these plants, and the ways we use this word outside of a plant context.
Elena Kirby, Masumi Rodriguez, and Emi Takahashi create work surrounding the plant known as dog-strangling vine (DSV). In conversation with the show, artist Bhavika Sharma takes on the plumb bar using a weedy/migrant plant known as phragmites.
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DSV’s rhizomatic growth allows it to spread and return each year, forming a dense underground network through a kind of cloning. This pattern of propagation felt like a recursive, nested language, the starting point for an imagined DSV plant script. This exploration resulted in two paper works (75x110 cm) made from DSV pulp and unblended fibers.
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Exhibited at the plumb gallery in Tkaronto/Toronto, Canada, July 25 - August 17, 2025
Artists: Elena Kirby, Masumi Rodriguez, Emi Takahashi, Bhavika Sharma
Curated by: Emerald 邹佑
Text by: Chloe Gordon Chow
Documentation by: Em Moor, Elena Kirby, Masumi Rodriguez, Emi Takahashi
Human Person
2025
- Logo Design
- Merch Design
Slime mold logo and graphics for LA creative studio Human Person.
Sterilized oats were arranged in the shape of the ‘human person’ icon on a 15×15cm agar plate, then introduced to physarum polycephalum. Over the next few days, it crept, clustered, and wandered, consuming the figure and branching outward in intricate networks.
Combing through the scans, l looked for letterforms hidden in the growth.
GANNI: Fabrics of the Future
2024
- Glyph Design
- Logo Design
Set of custom glyphs for GANNI supporting their sustainability initiatives and earth-friendly material innovations. The forms were drawn from natural elements and made to complement Margot Lévêque’s GANNI butterfly symbol. I was also inspired to experiment on my own with printing on biomaterial—cyanotyping on agar agar with layered bubbles, varied exposure times, and citric acid.
Art Direction by Toni Hollowood
CD/AD, production, narrative + sound: Pitch Studios
3D design + animation: Bérénice Golmann
Arc’teryx Japan: VIEW FINDERS
2025
- Logo Design
- Graphic Design
Logo and graphic design support in collaboration with Studio Ran (Ray Masaki) for Arc’teryx Japan’s VIEW FINDERS, an in-store exhibition series celebrating artists inspired by the mountains. On display earlier this year at the Arc’teryx Futako Tamagawa store in Tokyo, it featured photographs of four Japanese mountains (Mt. Otensho, Mt. Kurobegorō, Mt. Yari, Mt. Aka) captured by Kyoko Kawano, printed on sheer fabric. Each photo was positioned so that visitors faced the direction of the mountain’s location.
Concept & Creative Direction by DCA Symphony, Brad Holdgrafer, James Koji Hunt
Photography by Kyoko Kawano
Production by Keisaku Ibuki, Drill, Hakuten
Installation Photography by Kohei Yamamoto
Organima: Ksha-sha
2024
- Animation
- Title Design
Ksha-sha, an animation embedded into a 180-page brick of paper made from ‘dog-strangling vine’.
This animation is made with ‘dog-strangling vine’, a plant species classified as invasive in Canada. The goal was to make an animation that felt a part of paper, and to tell a story of finding home in a new environment. Masumi and Elena collected the plant material locally, and together we used it to create both sheets of paper and serpentine characters that crawl about the space, learning to spread out.
Each new frame is layered on top of the last, creating a single artifact with the animation hidden throughout. Read more about the process on Nik's substack.
Co-directed with Nik Arthur
In collaboration with Masumi Rodriguez and Elena Kirby
Score by Ivy Boxall
KAZÉ·風
2023-2024
- Art, Scuplture & Installation
-
Exhibition Design
- Glyph Design
KAZÉ·風, named for the Japanese word for “wind”, is an immersive exhibition that brings to life a selection of Japanese onomatopoeic expressions that describe the elusive, ever-shifting character of the wind.
The five sculptural works presented in this exhibition embodied a diverse array of winds, from a tranquil breeze to a howling squall. To produce fluid forms reminiscent of each wind, black Sumi-e 墨絵 ink was methodically dropped into a basin of water and blown to produce elaborate ripples and swirls of ink. Each intricate Suminagashi 墨流し pattern was captured on rice paper and digitally collaged. These compositions were then translated into mixed-media sculptures using a variety of fabrication techniques, including laser cutting, CNC machining, and FDM and SLA 3D printing.
In this room of winds, visitors were invited to contemplate the synesthetic qualities of Japanese onomatopoeia, and the unexpected poetry of our ephemeral encounters—like a blade of grass gently swaying in the breeze.
Exhibited at My monkey gallery in Nancy, France between November 30, 2023-February 29, 2024.
I acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.
Collaboration with Michelle Kuan (art & design) and Hinako Omori (music).
Tyler McGillivary: Secret Garden
2024
- Logo Design
- Glyph Design
- Illustration
Custom logo, illustration, and icon for Tyler McGillivary’s fantasy shop Secret Garden. Inspired by magic realism, neofolk art, and nostalgia, the selection curated for Secret Garden toes the line between fantasy and reality.
Organima: Tch
2024
- Animation
- Title Design
When insects create a home on a maple leaf.
Inspired by the Maple Eyespot Gall and its circular formations, we explored storytelling through organic mark-making and attempting a narrative on a single leaf. We began by carefully stripping away the leaf's pulp to reveal a scaffold. The removed pulp was then repurposed as an ink and reapplied onto the leaf skeleton. This allowed us to animate the story of gall formation on a leaf using exclusively its own plant matter.
Galls are intricate growths on plant tissues made by burrowing insects. They become habitats for these insects, offering protection and food. They are often thought to be a disease, but are a crucial step in the lifecycle of some insects, and leave beautiful marks.
Collaboration with Nik Arthur (Animation) & Hinako Omori (Score).
Era of the Moon: Phases
2023
- Exhibition Poster & Pamphlet
- Film Titles & Credits
Poster/pamphlet and film titles to accompany Akash Inbakumar's solo exhibition, Era of the Moon: Phases.
Era of the Moon: Phases connects the body to the cyclical nature of the moon and its tidal lock to the earth. Looking up to the celestial body we see its phases through the dark and light chasing one another. Through textile exploration, Akash honours the internal dance between these two polarities and investigates the potency of the in-between.
The design takes its inspiration from Akash’s woven textiles and rich visual references, from the coiling form of a centipede to the cyclical phases of the moon. The blue and teal risograph print showcases Akash’s indigo-dyed artwork on the front and stills of their artistic process on the back. When held aloft, light pierces through the hole-punched lunar glyphs, which dance across the poster, echoing the exhibition’s choreographed performance.
Collaboration with Michelle Kuan.
Ghost Orchard - Jessamine
2022
- Glyph Design
- Chlorophyll Printing
- Animation
Music video for jessamine, part of ghost orchard's rainbow music album. Custom glyph sprite animation inspired by starling murmurations, chlorophyll-printed on 6 maple & grape leaf collages.
Collaboration with Nik Arthur.
Wheel of Fortune
2022
- Graphic Design
- Glyph Design
- Photography
Collaboration with artist Julia Dault, designing for the two sides of a large coin sculpture for York University.
The design composition takes its inspiration from diagrams of cosmic orbits and astrolabes, an instrument formerly used to make astronomical measurements. Orbital lines dynamically frame our custom celestial glyphs and Dault’s thoughtful text. The lines also reinforce the motion of the coin, which appears to have rolled into the courtyard. Custom celestial glyphs and their accompanying orbital lines were informed by our visual research of astronomical and astrological references, and the material considerations of steel fabrication. A modular graphic system was established to create compositions that reflect the relative scale of objects in the universe.
The sculpture, which stands 3 meters tall, is available for viewing outside The Quad at York University.
Designed with Michelle Kuan
Fabrication: Lafontaine Iron Werks
Hinako Omori - stillness, softness...
2023
- Art Direction
- Album Artwork
- Packaging Design (LP & CD)
- Merch Design
- Poster Design
- Live Visuals
Art direction and design for Hinako Omori’s second studio album 'stillness, softness…'. The artwork features solarized film photos by Luca Bailey, which I then cyanotype-printed. The interior gatefold includes cyanotyped objects that hold meaningful connections to each song in the album.
Hinako Omori - a journey...
2022
- Art Direction
- Album Artwork
- Packaging Design (LP & CD)
- Merch Design
- Photography
Album artwork and design for Hinako Omori's debut album a journey... Therapeutic frequencies, Japanese forest bathing, binaural field recordings, and ambient electronics are thoughtfully weaved together to evoke a stream of consciousness journey through natural environments. The artwork captures a cartography of the mind, revealing subconscious acts of mind wandering and fragmented thoughts and memories. Environmental images were sourced from film photos taken in Bath, UK where the field recordings for the album were collected.
Photographs on Artwork: Katie May & Hinako Omori
Label: Houndstooth Label
Hinako Omori
2023
- Custom Wordmark
- Art Direction
- Poster Design
Elegant custom bi-scriptual logo, icon, and textures designed for ambient music artist Hinako Omori. The custom wordmark takes visual cues from Omori’s frequent sources of inspiration and aims to capture the ethereal quality of her soundscapes.
Photograph on Poster: Annie Lai
A Journey
2022
- Video Direction
- Editing
Music video for A Journey by Hinako Omori. The video is an ode to the rich, immersive and healing soundscape that blends binaural field recordings with ambient synths. Inspired and guided by nature, the collected footage captures environmental glimpses that evoke fragments of a personal memory. A risograph-printed analog treatment echoes the voice in fleeting moments.