Instructors for Teen Courses

Cath Hughes is a British-Canadian visual artist who works in painting, drawing, collage and assemblage. She holds a BFA in Painting from the Ruskin School of Art, Oxford University, a MA in Museums and Galleries in Education from London University, and a Postgraduate Certificate in secondary art education from Goldsmiths College, University of London. Cath began her career in education as a high school art teacher in London, then worked for several years as a freelance gallery educator, programmer, researcher and writer in some of the foremost London galleries such as Tate Modern and the National Gallery. She moved to Vancouver in 2008 and now teaches at Emily Carr and at Burnaby Art Gallery.

Christopher Jung is a second generation Canadian with parents from Honduras and Germany. Chris works in disparate mediums that include painting, circuitry, coding and sound. He earned a masters degree in Applied Arts (2016) and a diploma in Engineering Design and Technology (2005). As an artist, art educator and graphic designer, his work revolves around Latin American commodities using hybrid techniques to portray his mixed culture and the diaspora experienced as a Latino in Canada. You can find him leading educational programming at New Media Gallery or see some of his film posters like The Rankin File: Legacy of a Radical or Jean Swanson: We Need a New Map at local documentary festivals.

Colette Parras works at the intersection of Architecture and Communications, crafting design narratives that connect people and place. Multi-disciplinary by nature, she brings a broad range of international professional experience to her projects. For over a decade Colette Parras worked as an architect and researcher at an office based in the Netherlands before returning to her home city of Vancouver.

Having honed her creative problem-solving skills while working at international architectural practices deeply rooted in design, theory and experimentation, Colette now works as an independent designer and communications consultant since launching narrativist design in 2018.

Since 2014, Colette has held the position of Adjunct Professor at the University of British Columbia, teaching in the Bachelor of Environmental Design and The Master of Architecture and Landscape Architecture program. In 2018, Colette accepted an appointment in the Communication Design Essential program at the Emily Carr University of Art and Design.

Darren Brereton has worked for a variety of Canadian and international animation studios (NFB; Disney- Paris & Vancouver; Cinar; Bardel; DHX; Atomic; etc.) as an animator, in storyboarding, direction, layout, posing, and special effects animation. An honours graduate of Emily Carr University of Art + Design in Animation and Sound Design, he is a hard-working animator, instructor, and fan of all things relating to character-driven animation. An excellent critic of script writing, boarding, layouts, timing, editing, sound design, and all other aspects of animation production, he can coax the best out of fledgling animators and students. He is also a keen observationalist, especially of the happy accidents in day-to-day life, as well as a prolific cyclist and seasonal softball player.

David Alba is an architectural designer specializing in digital fabrication. He has enjoyed the opportunity to be engaged in architectural projects across a variety of contexts, from his home province of British Columbia, as well as in Ontario, Europe and Africa. He is excited by the potential that design has to actively contribute toward community wellbeing and to facilitate extraordinary experiences.

David is passionate about providing opportunities for learning and creativity for a diverse group of students. He received a Masters of Architecture from the University of Toronto and holds a Bachelors of Environmental Design from the University of British Columbia.

Hayley Carruthers is an artist currently living and making on the unceeded territories of the Coast Salish peoples including the S?wx?w¨²7mesh (Squamish), St¨®:l¨­ and S?l?¨ªlw?ta?/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh), and x?m?¦Èk??y??m (Musqueam) Nations.

Hayley approaches making as a means of thinking, learning, and questioning. She works primarily in drawing and screenprinting.

Her work takes a speculative approach to reflecting on subjective experiences of mental imagery, perception, and other neural phenomena. Hayley¡¯s work often entangles with ways of understanding from scientific knowledges within neuroscience and engages with histories of scientific renderings that visualize the invisible. In her process, she embraces ambiguity and what can¡¯t be seen ¨Cthe unknown¨C as a field of generative inquiry.

Compelled by the wonder and strangeness in her subjective experience of being, Hayley draws upon her own internal space to pull out images from memory and give them a material presence. One of the challenges her work explores is how to resist making the strange familiar ¨Cto let these images exist in their strangeness. She uses drawing as a process to perceive the intangible internal moments of her reality, not looking to understand but to wonder -to arrive at more questions. To remember that not everything is as it seems.

Joe Gianoglio is an experienced 2D artist with over a decade of experience across multiple departments and disciplines including 2D assets, concept art and UI/UX. He is fluent with Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator and Indesign with additional knowledge on XD, Figma and Unity. His background in 2D illustration + User Interface + promotional/marketing graphics + digital painting has gotten him involved in many different projects across multiple platforms (Console / Desktop / Mobile).

Joni Taylor is an artist / illustrator / writer, whose work is deeply informed by the eclectic influences of MAD Magazine (from the 70s, now known as Classic Mad), SNL (Roseanne Roseannadanna), the chaotic satirical work of Ralph Steadman, and the dynamic duo of Roald Dahl ¡ª whose characters and plots are always a little on the naughty side, and Quentin Blake ¡ª whose illustrations are decidedly quirky.

Passionate about the plight of the underdog (takes one to know one), Joni¡¯s subjects are those who are unknown and unseen yet have incredible amounts to offer. From feminism to ageism and global warming, Joni feels strongly about setting the record straight ¡ª even if it¡¯s just in her own mind. Her work is imbued with her own hyperbolic sense of what¡¯s funny and what¡¯s possible to get away with.

Josh Hite¡¯s work is concerned with tactics for documentation and human movement through local spaces. He creates reorganized archives of particular spaces and behaviors either through recordings he makes himself or by appropriating content through sites like YouTube. He is a member of the Vancouver Soundwalk Collective and part of Ten Fifteen Maple, a two-year artist residency exploring multiple waterfront parks in Vancouver. He also regularly collaborates with theatre and dance companies. Josh has a BA in Philosophy, an MFA in Visual Art and teaches photography and media arts at the University of British Columbia.

Joyce Lam holds a bachelor¡¯s degree in Design (B.Des, 2012) from Emily Carr University and a master¡¯s degree in Digital Media (MDM, 2015) from the Centre for Digital Media. Born and raised in Vancouver, she has been working in tech for over 15 years in a variety of design and web development roles. She is obsessed with the pursuit of defining good design and finding the perfect harmony between art and technology. With every project, her goal is to create meaningful experiences that solves problems. Since 2016, Joyce has been teaching interaction design courses at Emily Carr University.

Katharine Dickinson works as a professional artist, illustrator and educator in Vancouver, B.C. After completing her M.A. in London, England at the Slade School of Fine Art at University College London U.K. after graduating she worked for London illustration agent Artists Partners for ten years as a freelance illustrator for a range of clients (including The Financial Times, Harper Collins, Penguin books, Red Stripe and Philips Electrical). Katharine continued her career as a digital illustrator for animation in Vancouver, working for Mainframe and Bardel Entertainment.

Currently her interest and priority is teaching art to adults and teens while continuing with her own art practice of drawing and watercolour painting. She has a unique ability to demonstrate technical information in a way that inspires confidence and builds knowledge. Her method aims to achieve high levels of competence in technical and expressive forms, using digital and traditional art-making techniques.

Keith Shapland is an industrial designer who specializes in the development of mock-ups and prototypes, both physical and digital. He has worked on projects ranging in scale from a full-size mock-up of a 747 to delicate medical devices. He has developed prototypes of aviation data recorder ¡°black box¡¯¡± systems and participated in the engineering destruction testing of the prototypes and production units. Keith has designed, fabricated and installed tradeshow booths and museum exhibits. He has fabricated architectural, topographic and engineering models. Keith also worked in the entertainment industry as an image compositor, utilizing his digital skills to extract 2D imagery from the 3D animations on such projects as Beast Machines and MTV¡¯s Spiderman.

Morgan Martino is an interdisciplinary designer, researcher and facilitator, whose work focuses on building and supporting communities that can foster caring relationships, critical learning, and informed social change. Her current research practice explores how everyday material culture and designed systems inform and reflect our complex relationships to care. Morgan graduated from Emily Carr University of Art + Design in spring of 2021, studying Industrial Design and Social Practice + Community Engagement, and was the student speaker for her graduating class. Morgan currently works as a research assistant for Emily Carr¡¯s Health Design Lab and coordinates the Roving Designers, a collective she founded in fall 2020.

Phoebe Nezil is an animator, illustrator and educator living on unceded Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh territories. Phoebe has a Bachelor of Media Arts from Emily Carr and a Bachelor of Education from SFU, and uses both to teach media arts and animation to high school students in Port Moody and Vancouver. In her down time, Phoebe shoots film photography, plays Minecraft and tries to convince everyone to watch Star Trek: The Next Generation. Phoebe lives with her cat, surrounded by books, and dreams of new ways to approach and pursue visual storytelling.

Rebecca Bayer is an interdisciplinary Canadian artist based in Vancouver on the traditional unceded territory of the Squamish, Tsleil-Waututh, and Musqueam Nations. Rebecca's practice reflects on connections between people and place through the use of colour, pattern, texture, and form. She has a background in both Fine Art and Architecture (BFA Queen's University, MA Fine Art University Arts London, MArch University of British Columbia), and has maintained a professional art and design studio since 2013. Some recent works include Merge, Hwy#1, North Vancouver BC (2022), Maple Ridge Community Mosaic, Maple Ridge BC (2020), The Whole Is Greater Than The Sum Of Its Parts, Sherbourne Subway Station, Toronto ON (2018), and Calder Community Mosaic, Edmonton AB (2018).

Stephen Pearce is an inspired instructor who specializes in teaching foundational to advanced courses ranging from life drawing and color theory to animation and conceptual design for environments, creatures, and characters in traditional and digital techniques. Stephen graduated from the Animation programs at Capilano University and Vanarts, and has gained extensive experience in the animation and games industries, working as a 2D and 3D animator, conceptual design artist, and senior artist for several games, film, and TV studios. Stephen's diverse portfolio includes collaborations with notable studios such as Mainframe, Bardel, Dreamworks, A.K.A. Cartoon, Backbone Ent., and IUGO, on high-profile projects including Action Man, Heavy Gear, Joseph, Sonic Rival 2, Monster Lab, Bomberman Live, Knights and Dragons, and Walking Dead Road to Survival. Through his exceptional teaching and real-world experience, Stephen imparts his expertise to students at all skill levels, from beginners to advanced learners.

Stephanie Broder (she/her) is an illustrator and writer whose primary interest lies in storytelling. She unabashedly loves action-packed adventure stories and stories about young protagonists tackling issues well beyond their years. She's working on 1-3 novels + graphic novels simultaneously at any given time, including a favourite project about teenage telepaths.

Stephanie has a BFA in Illustration from Emily Carr University of Art + Design (2019) and also, just to keep you guessing, a BA in Economics from the University of British Columbia, Okanagan (2014). Somewhere between those two she lived and worked in rural Japan where she first picked up shodo (Japanese calligraphy) and has since won many silver and gold medals in competitions.

Tom Chan has over 25 years in the design industry, where he learned to be a highly dexterous creative. He provokes the left brain with new ideas and paradigms and fuels the right brain with creative challenges within project guidelines. He applies a simple mantra to his work: To deliver value throughout the creative process.

With imagination, innovation and vision, Tom has run small design studios, worked in larger agency environments, invested in start-ups and created long term relationships with clients and their customers. He craves the energy of creative teams and collaborate with them to craft memorable and sustainable stories based on authentic narratives.

Tom's approaches problem solving from a place of curiosity, relentlessly testing his own mental model. This ensures that he is able to understand the challenge; get deep empathy with users; build solutions based on a system; and forsee how that will impact the broader community.

While he may not have the answers, facilitating conversations, presenting ideas to stakeholders, mentoring creatives and coaching new designers, typically leads to better collective outcomes.

Mx. Vee Chorabik (they/them) is a Polish-Canadian artist living and working in Vancouver, the unceded homelands of the x?m?¦Èk??y? ?m (Musqueam), s?wx?w¨²7mesh (Squamish) and s?l ?ilw?ta?? (Tsleil-waututh) Nations. They are a transdisciplinary artist with an MFA from Emily Carr University of Art + Design, 2021. Their practice includes installation, collage (digital and analogue), drawing, painting, collaboration, research, fun, and play. They use whatever medium best suits the conceptual and aesthetic nature of the project.

Vee teaches at Emily Carr University of Art + Design, and they've been working regularly as an exhibiting artist since graduating from Langara College in 2017. By queering art, language, and education Vee aims to create a more celebratory, loving, and accessible world.

Their current show line-up includes:
¡°Vancouver Outsider Arts Festival,¡± Roundhouse Community Centre, Oct 12-17, 2023
¡°The Pursuit of PLAYsure,¡± Slice of Life Gallery, Nov 23-28, 2023

Vjeko Sager is an artist, educator and curator, awarded, exhibited and represented in public and private collections in Canada, Japan, Hungary, Italy, USA and former Yugoslavia. He received a Masters Degree in Applied Arts from the University of Arts in Belgrade and was appointed a Associate Professor in Painting Techniques at the Faculty of Applied Arts & Design in Belgrade. Vjeko participated at numerous art events in Europe and in 1994 he moved to Vancouver. His recent works are exhibited at 35 international and local exhibitions and represented in the Slide Registry at the Drawing Center in New York. He curated the exhibition "Art in Exile" for Artropolis 2003 (visited by 10,000 people) and lectured at the UBC Grand Rounds, SFU Philosopher's Cafe and participated at many local art events.

Weronika Stepien is an artist that incorporates 3D animation, drawing, painting, and sculpture. In her work, she re-inscribes the representational tropes and technology of gaming and fantasy CGI animation into a visual matrix. Weronika graduated from Emily Carr University¡¯s Film and Video and Integrated Media program in 2009 and the University of British Columbia's Masters of Fine Art in 2019. She has studied in the United States, Germany, and the Netherlands and has exhibited work in various galleries around Vancouver. She has 10 years of experience in teaching art and animation to students of all ages.