Artifacts of Grief

Carly shares the story of grieving that life has turned out differently than expected. Carly longs for a life she has envisioned since she was young. She speaks to the work of making space for grief while engaging in intentional healing. She offers space to hold difficult truths in tensions, grieving for what she longs for and making a future that leaves room for both what she is and is not in control of. Carly Reirson (she/her) is an Alberta-born, Vancouver based singer-songwriter, performing artist, videographer, and all around creative. With two albums and multiple awards to her name, Carly continues to immerse herself in the worlds of the creative, both as a professional and as a steward of the arts.  Rooted in her relationships with herself, her spirituality, her friendships and the world around her, Carly’s work transforms lived experience into art that connects deeply to the human heart. Profoundly shaped by grief, Carly's music explores themes of loss, love and longing, with the hope that her story can serve as a voice for those navigating their own grief and sorrow. When she’s not performing, filming or chasing her next creative opportunity, Carly can be found watching her favourite movies, baking beautiful cakes and cookies, thrifting for hidden gems, drinking good coffee, and spending time with the people she loves.

Yeon Soo shares the story of choosing to reclaim her birth name, after years of going by a name chosen for convenience. She speaks to the intentionality in choosing to go by Yeon Soo again and, in this choice, the two different sets of reality that her different names have represented. Yeon Soo asks: who else could I have been? She offers space to consider what it means to think through the possible paths that life could have taken us down and how to move forward on the ones we are currently on with intentionality. Yeon Soo Ha (she/her) was born in Seoul and now lives in amiskwacîwâskahikan/Edmonton. She enjoys hosting friends for dinner, reading books from the public library, and growing flowers in her garden. You can read more about Yeon Soo’s story in her CBC article.

Greg deJong shares the story of the unexpected loss of his close friend and business partner, Brett. In the throes of mourning, Greg found an unusual doorway to grief. In welcoming this doorway as an intentional portal to working through grief, Greg offers space to consider the creation of ritual around grief processing. Greg deJong (he/him) is good at problem-solving but is at a point in his life where he wants to spend less time solving other peoples' problems; he has been paying closer attention to how he can integrate more physical creativity into his life.

Kenyon shares the story of their loss of a home recently found: New Orleans. They bring with them an object of creation that honours the pain of losing home and the feeling of deeply missing a place. Through their grief story, Kenyon offers space to consider the ways in which creation can be a grief process, as we consider what it means to make and remake home. Kenyon (KD) Burton (she/they)A wayward American who bounced from Oklahoma into Texas, then on to Louisiana, before making the big move to Edmonton, Alberta in 2021. A full-time history lecturer at the University of Alberta, Kenyon loves having the opportunity to work with students, helping them to find and pursue their own curiosities about the past. Outside of teaching, Kenyon is the host of the podcast Outcasts of the Earth, a fan of the New Orleans Saints (who dat!), a new-to-hockey fan of the local Oilers, as well as a full-time pet parent to two tuxedo cats (Salvador and Oscar), plus her ride or die, a fourteen-year-old beagle named Rigby.

Tor shares the story of their journey towards peace, as they continue to work at reconciling the memories of a happy childhood with the reality of hardship and harm. Tor brings an object at once tangibly potent and symbolic of the ways in which what happens in childhood leaves wounds that risk reopening as we age and understand more about our pasts. Through their grief story, Tor offers a space to consider what healing and peace look like in the journey of grief. Tor (they/she/he) is a 34 year old mixed race queer kid, living on Treaty 6 territory. Born into a large family of multidisciplinary artists, Vic spends a lot of time pondering the potential of random objects and trying to control the urge to start projects that they definitely won’t finish. They enjoy long walks in the river valley, snuggling with their dog, and excessive snacking.This episode contains brief mention of domestic violence and suicidal ideation. Take care while listening.

Kylie Burton—English teacher and writer—shares the story of the loss of her grandparents’ and father’s businesses. Through her grief story, Kylie offers space to consider how the loss of physical places—and the sense memories they hold—can complicate the loss of the people they represent. A surprising discovery helps Kylie to honour these places and to create emotional space to consider how the loss of physical space can be navigated through memory, conversation, and practices of remembrance.

Elliott Kuss (he/him)—art director and creative—shares the story of his love of video stores and his deep sadness over the death of them. Through his grief story, Elliott offers space to consider the ways nostalgia, understood as grief, creates space to bring the present and past into conversation, in order to provide the opportunity to intentionally consider how to not just mourn the past, but honour it.

Carolyn Reny (she/her)—a curious person, by nature—shares her experiences with travel. She brings an object that represents the movement through space that has resulted in both loss and change in her life, many times over. Through her grief story, Carolyn offers a space to think about holding contradictory emotions together so that we might welcome the way our experiences unmake and remake us.