Meet Your Maker

Khadija Aziz is a Toronto-based textile artist and educator. Her specialization in textile arts is needlework, including beading and South Asian embroidery. She marries these slow hand-craft techniques with the immediate and chance-based outcomes of digital manipulation methods using a photo scanner. Her art has been exhibited in Canada, the USA, Australia, and Austria, and received recognition through awards from Craft Ontario (2025, 2020, 2019) and the Surface Design Association (2020). Khadija’s art has also been published in magazines, books, and conference papers in Canada (Canadian Craft Federation, 2020 and 2021; UPPERCASE Magazine, 2021; and more), the USA (the Surface Design Journal, 2020), and Prague (TEXTile Manifestos, 2022).

A graduate of Sheridan College, Emma Bickers explores intimate connections through visual storytelling on earthenware figurative vessels. Bickers’ work depicts the vulnerable theme of Sapphic identity, capturing tender emotions and loving narratives on the surfaces of her works. Originally planning to be an illustrator, she found interest in ceramics after taking an introductory course. She now combines the two to create colourful illustrations that decorate the surface of large organic vessels.

Bickers became an Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre in 2023.

Mariana Bolaños Inclan is a Mexican artist based in Toronto. She is a graduate of Sheridan College. She has created a diverse body of work in painting and ceramics, focusing on art with a social purpose. She is a facilitator in community programs with children, women and newcomers around Toronto and the GTA. Inclan has collaborated with the Neighbourhood Arts Network, North York Arts and Muse Arts. She also received the RBC Arts Access Fund and received grants from the Toronto Arts Council and the Ontario Arts Council with Pinceles Latinos Collective. She exhibits her work regularly and has been part of several shows in Canada, Cuba and Mexico. Inclan studied visual arts in Mexico and obtained a Diploma in Fine Arts when she moved to Canada.

Inclan became an Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre in 2023.

“I grew up as a stranger to my own story, adopted and re-named, grafted into a new family tree. The discovery in adulthood of my Métis heritage was a revelation that set me on a path of discovery and my developing story as an Indigenous heritage woman and her quest for harmony with the natural world. I am a proud citizen of the Métis Nation of Ontario.

Since July 2021, I have created over 150 fibre art installations at residential school historical sites, museums, galleries and other public spaces. This project, #hopeandhealingcanada, aims to bridge the gap between settlers and First Nations, Métis and Inuit people by creating approachable and non-confrontational art and starting a conversation about decolonization and reconciliation. During my residency at Harbourfront Centre, I will be making a body of work addressing the opioid crisis in Canada with a focus on how we approach grief as well as the stigma surrounding mental health, of which addiction is a part. In February 2023, there were a recorded 216 opioid-related deaths in Ontario. My 23-year-old son Parker was one of those lost. I cannot solve the fundamental causes of the problem of opioid addiction. Still, I can help to make it a tangible and visceral visual reminder that no one is immune to this issue. While memorializing those we have lost, this project will also create a substantial representation of just how many.”

Jiho Choi is a South Korean jeweller and metalsmith. He comes from an engineering background, studying at Hanyang University. Choi started jewellery making as an apprentice in Korea before studying at NSCAD University in Halifax, NS. While at NSCADU, he found an interest in kinetic objects. His works are interactive, generating satisfaction and playfulness to for the viewer.

Choi became an Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre in 2023.

Nilou Ghaemi is a ceramic artist living and practicing in Tkaronto, also known as Toronto. Born in Tehran, Iran, she immigrated to Canada as a teenager. She received a bachelor’s degree in graphic design from OCADU in 2015. After practicing as a professional graphic designer, Ghaemi returned to school to pursue a career in ceramics, completing a four-year program at Sheridan College.

Working as a graphic designer before pursuing ceramics has had a significant influence on her creation and production processes. She utilizes a multidisciplinary approach: drawn elements and photographs of the subjects are digitally manipulated and serve as a scaffold for the surface treatment of the work. Experimental processes are a driving force within her practice, pushing clay beyond its expected boundaries. Ghaemi’s main areas of focus are hand-building and sculptural works. The work is an amalgamation of perceived reality and fantasy, dissolving boundaries between time and space. Clay, as a shapeshifting material, is inherently contradictory, being both fragile and seemingly everlasting, making ceramics a fitting medium for exploring the ideas and experiences surrounding decay, ephemerality, and memory.

Ghaemi was awarded and began her role as Ceramics Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre on June 1, 2025.

Alan Guzman is an emerging, multidisciplinary artist specializing in jewellery and engraving. His artistic journey began with lino carving, leading him to discover the intricate art of engraving and ignited his passion for goldsmithing. Guzman is a graduate of the Jewellery Arts program at George Brown College. His inspiration comes from Art Deco, contemporary engraving and relief sculpting so he can create pieces that exude elegance and craftsmanship. Committed to artistic growth, Guzman is eager to pursue further education focused on engraving, sculpting and microsetting, continuously shaping the art of his jewellery creations.

Guzman became an Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre in 2023.

Charlie Larouche-Potvin discovered glass at Espace Verre in Montreal, where he graduated in 2020. He quickly became obsessed with blown glass work, specifically Venetian techniques. To perfect his knowledge, he took training with William Gudenrath at the Corning Museum of Glass (New York, USA) and with Davide Fuin in Murano (Italy). He sees the making of Venetian cups as a way to engage in conversation with glass, which he sees as an element that evolves and transforms on its own. Larouche-Potvin is currently a member of Atelier Fusion at Espace Verre, a program that allows him to work and refine glass techniques.

Larouche-Potvin became an Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre in 2023.

Bram Locknick is an artist and sculptor who works with kiln-formed and blown glass. He graduated from Sheridan College and holds a BA with Honours in philosophy from the University of Toronto. From Windsor, Ontario, Locknick was inspired by the towering Detroit skyline at an early age. His background in philosophy informs curious instincts, helping to develop conceptual work and translating concepts into glass.

Locknick became an Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre in 2023.

Liam MacAloney is a Toronto-born artist with a BFA in Photography from Concordia University and an MFA from NSCAD, where he focused on textile art. He is a lifelong knitter and crocheter and has adapted his practice to include making his materials. MacAloney’s current work involves handspun fibre used to create cloth through various techniques, as well as the use of natural dyes and foraging for wild colours.

He is interested in conceptualizing processes and materials, and his current work explores the tension between the horror genre and the medium of textiles. He has participated in several group shows organized by his peers and curated several of his own, most notably String & Wire (curated alongside metalsmith and jeweller Qiuchen “Echo” Ji) and his solo exhibition Scary Yarn, which showcased the results of the artistic research conducted during his MFA.

MacAloney was awarded and began his full-time role at Harbourfront Centre’s Craft and Design Residency in the Fall of 2025, where he will focus on textile art and continue to explore the relationship that craft has with human lived experiences.

Christian Maidankine has completed his Master of Architecture at Toronto Metropolitan University and is now an Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre. His background in architecture and interest in making has led to his exploring various materials, mainly leather.

Having aphantasia, the inability to imagine any types of visuals or sensations, Maidankine has developed a process rooted in making through iteration. Sketchbooks are constantly filled with notes and drawings, moving into maquettes, full-scale mockups and the final material. Documentation is critical to this process to record observations and suggestions for future work. Craft and design play an integral role in our lives, and working with leather has allowed Maidankine to explore aspects which we, quite literally, carry with us in our everyday lives. Primarily, his work carefully considers making, crafting and the person for whom the object is made.

After a foundation year at the California College of the Arts, Rayce Min continued his studies at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, with a focus on Jewellery Design and metalsmithing. As an emerging metalsmith, Min has participated in numerous national exhibitions. He has participated in and placed first in the 5th Emerging Artist Design Competition, organized by the Canadian Gemmological Association in Toronto, Ontario. Additionally, he was the winner of the 20th Annual National Jewellery Student Competition, organized by L. A. Pai Art Jewellery Gallery in Ottawa, Ontario. He is also a finalist for the Tactile Chronicle: 2022 Silver Society of Canada NSCAD Student Competition and the Canadian Student Silversmithing Competition 2023.

Min is focusing on his personal growth as an artist while exploring a variety of metal-forming techniques utilizing the characteristics of metal: rigid yet flexible enough to create. He was awarded and began his role as a full-time Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre on September 1, 2025.

Yalda Mohajer is a jewellery artist with an architectural background, fascinated by the inner marriage of both practices to create innovative jewellery.

Her jewellery is from a transcending process that breathes new life into precious metals such as gold, silver and gemstones. This process includes melding traditional methods, such as forming and forging, with leading-edge 3D printing technology and software. This blended ideation enriches the process and allows for the creation of complex forms.

Mohajer’s jewellery makes a statement infused with narratives that far outweigh the value of the shiny object itself.

Mohajer became an Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre in 2023.

Ella Morreale is a multidisciplinary textile artist and printmaker. Through material practices, she explores themes of identity, the body, intimacy and the self. Morreale employs text and gestural drawings applied to the fibre, utilizing surface design techniques such as polychromatic printing and stitching. Her practice is rooted in intuition. Working in the same manner, one would pull a tarot card; each piece is embedded with text and symbols which define an archetype of the self. She draws her inspiration from the shadow self and the parts of ourselves we keep hidden. Her work investigates you and me and how we connect through our collective undoing.

Morreale is Hamilton-born, now Toronto-based. She is a recent Graduate of OCAD U, having just completed her Thesis in Material Art and Design. She was awarded and began her role as a full-time Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre on June 1, 2025.

Ellinor Nelson-Hachey is a goldsmith based in Toronto, Ontario. She graduated from the Jewellery Arts program at George Brown College in 2024. Brought up in a family where holiday gifts were meticulously handcrafted goods rather than store-bought knick-knacks, she has developed a love for creating jewellery and fine craft and the joy found in sharing them with others.

Nelson-Hachey is inspired by the dissociated consumption of all things horror through secondary perspectives that impart everything from lore to artistic choices to honest world commentary, creating an anatomized and warped version of the original creation. She explores the pageantry and showmanship of horror through gruesome elements, and delicate imagery dissected much like a botanical rendering. She is aiming to create a mix of wonder with a slight delightful cringe as if experiencing a microdose of a horror movie.

Nelson-Hachey became an Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre’s Craft & Design Studio (Jewellery/Metal) in 2024.

Caelan Nowicki moved to Calgary, Alberta, in 2021 to pursue her passion for the arts at the Alberta University of the Arts and Design, where she majors in fibre and textiles. Taking a glass-blowing class in the second year of her degree, she discovered her love for glass and has not looked back. Within her work, she continues to further her practice by combining her two preferred mediums, glass and textiles, through pattern, texture and colour, as well as physically blending the two mediums to create sculptural work.

Other than being a full-time student and working part-time, Nowicki also continued to show dedication by being a Teaching Assistant for the continuing education classes in the evenings and weekends, co-running the AUArts Glass Club social media and finishing her senior year as Vice President of the glass club helping run production nights and multiple different student-run sales to fundraise for visiting artists within the glass department. Being able to showcase her mixed media work at the Glass Art Society Student Exhibition in 2024 solidified her confidence when she returned to AUArts for her final year and graduated from the glass program with a fibre minor in the spring of 2025.

Nowicki was awarded and began her role as a full-time Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre on September 1, 2025.

Keenan O’Toole is a Toronto-based artist working primarily in ceramics and sculpture. She earned her MFA from Kent State University in 2025, following a Bachelor in Craft and Design from Sheridan College (2019) and further studies at Alberta University of the Arts (2020). Her work has been exhibited in cities including Toronto, Cincinnati, New York, and Cleveland.

O’Toole’s practice explores form, colour and scale through traditional ceramic building methods. She engages in a cyclical process of translating structural references into both two- and three-dimensional compositions, utilizing abstraction to explore how physical frameworks influence perception, memory and movement. Geometric shapes and modular systems echo the underlying infrastructures of pipes, grids and conduits, calling attention to how we subconsciously navigate space. Lines function in her work as directional signals, guiding flow through material and form. Through iterative repetition, she builds a visual language that references universal spatial markers — horizontal and vertical divisions, containment and extension. Her sculptures and drawings operate like fragmented maps or speculative models, inviting viewers to reflect on the systems that structure both built environments and internal experiences.

Laura Papworth is a Canadian metalsmith and artist based in Toronto, Ontario. She was raised in Calgary, Alberta and moved to Toronto in 2015 to obtain her BFA in Design from Toronto Metropolitan University. After working primarily in digital pursuits, she sought to experiment with different mediums of creative art. This led her to begin studying Jewellery Arts at George Brown College in 2022.  Papworth’s dedication to her studies has led to her winning an award sponsored by the Canadian Jewellers’ Association for the highest GPA in 2024 and being granted a summer residency at Harbourfront Centre in the same year.

In her graduating year, Papworth won awards sponsored by Mejuri and Craft Ontario. Her education in design and jewellery has led her to discover a passion for combining her technical training with the use of alternative materials and non-precious metals in creating art jewellery. Her work takes particular inspiration from the playful forms and colours seen in Toronto’s urban environment. Papworth’s decade-long journey of living in Toronto has given her a profound appreciation for the city as a green metropolis. In this place, diverse modes of transportation are encouraged, innovation thrives and communities are built. She seeks to apply the collaborative nature of cities to her work, centring collaboration as the driving force behind the development of her designs.

Laura was awarded and began her role as a full-time Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre on June 1, 2025.

Viyan Petekkaya is a Kurdish jewellery and metal artist based in Canada. Her work, primarily non-representational, carries modernist influences and constructs a visual narrative that invites introspection and contemplation. She is intrigued by the challenge of translating abstract concepts into tangible forms, often resulting in sculptural pieces.

Petekkaya’s work has been showcased in several exhibitions across Canada, such as the Vancouver Metal Arts Association’s Evolving Spaces: Transitional in Nature and the Alberta Craft Council’s Coming Up Next. Additionally, she was featured in the Society of North American Goldsmiths’ Annual Student Exhibition in the United States. She is a recipient of the Mountain Gems Artistic Achievement Award and the Craft Council of British Columbia’s Emerging Artists in Contemporary Craft Award.

Petekkaya holds a Bachelor of International Economics from the University of British Columbia and a Jewellery Art & Design diploma from Vancouver Community College. After spending a decade in Vancouver, she relocated to Toronto in 2024 upon being accepted as a full-time Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre. She is excited to build new connections within the Toronto jewellery industry, immerse herself in the local art and culture scene and continue to nurture her ties with the Vancouver jewellery community.

Eleni Papkov is a sculptor and experimental glassblower based in Toronto. Her work centres around forming visual experience into a moment of discovery, approaching sculpture as a vessel for reflection. With a foundation in traditional glassblowing techniques, her work challenges the boundaries of the medium, incorporating mixed media and shortening the gap between glass and its relationship with disparate materials.

Papkov’s work explores concepts of self through rhythm, gesture, tension and space – elements that shape her process and influence how her work interacts with the environment it inhabits. She is driven by creating technically precise, emotionally resonant and spatially aware work to provide an uninterrupted experience. Whether through standalone pieces or integrated installations, her practice invites deeper engagement with material, form and space.

Eleni was awarded the summer Artist-in-Residence program at Harbourfront Centre for the summer of 2024. She then graduated from Sheridan College’s Craft and Design Glass program in 2025 and was awarded a position, beginning her role as a full-time Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre on September 1, 2025.

Juliana Scherzer is a textile artist working primarily in free-motion machine embroidery and quilted leaves. Her work explores the duality of the known and unknown roles of textiles in our everyday lives, as explored through the themes of biology, mending, community, and environmentalism.

After graduating from Sheridan College in 2018 with a Bachelor of Craft and Design, Juliana spent three years as an artist-in-residence at the Cape Breton Centre for Craft and Design where she continued to build her practice while branching out into production work and teaching a range of textile and art courses in the community.

Juliana was accepted as an Artist-in-Residence (Textiles) at Harbourfront Centre in 2021.

Olivia Mae Sinclair is a textile-book artist. Her intuitive and trauma-based practice is guided by sloppy craft and imperfection. She is addicted to infatuation and Redbull. She is a maker of books, love and other grotesque things.

She has recently graduated from OCAD University’s Interdisciplinary Master’s in Art, Media and Design program. She earned her Bachelor’s degree in Craft and Design at Sheridan College.

Typically books made from fabric are intended for children and infants. Olivia Mae Sinclair’s books however are made for lovers, survivors, artists, her, him, them and me.

Olivia was accepted as an Artist-in-Residence (Textiles) at Harbourfront Centre in 2021.

Mohammad Tabesh (he/him) is a mixed-media artist residing and working in Toronto. His practice is focused on the human condition, the art of resistance, art and social change. Through writing, printmaking, multimedia and sculpture, Tabesh strives to convey these stories in a profoundly human and universal language, avoiding the cliché of shock and horrors of violence on the one hand and the abstract notion of war far away on the other. His ceramic work, including sculptural forms and sound installations, focuses on themes of body and censorship.

Tabesh completed his BFA at OCAD University and is the 2020 recipient of OCAD University’s Sculpture and Installation medal. He was accepted as an Artist-in-Residence for Ceramics at Harbourfront Centre in 2022.

Kate Tessier is a Chartered Industrial Designer with a penchant for lighting, material reclamation and developing new work as part of a collaborative curatorial practice that goes by the name Kilowatt Kate. Kate joins Harbourfront Centre as Senior Designer-in-Residence and as curator of Everyday Lighting, now in its second iteration. Kate brings two decades of experience in product development to offer her expertise to fellow Artists-in-Residence to develop some exquisite and captivating new work.

Anthony Toomey was born in suburban Philadelphia and began his experience with glass while studying architecture at the University of Hawaii. His interest in glass led him to transfer to Alfred University in New York, where he earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in glass in 2022.  During his academic career, Toomey worked in various studios in California, New York, Virginia, Hawaii and Italy. After graduating, he worked in Ohio and most recently completed an apprenticeship in Davide Fuin’s studio in Murano, Italy.  These experiences have formed the foundation for his Venetian-inspired glasswork, including goblet-making, vases and various traditional forms of glassware. Toomey believes that the Venetian style of glass-making requires excellence in every aspect of the process and strives to adhere to that principle in everything he creates.

Toomey became an Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre’s Craft & Design Studio (Glass) in 2024.

Marina Van Raay is a Canadian Japanese ceramic artist based in Hamilton, Ontario. She is a graduate of the bachelor’s program in Craft and Design at Sheridan College. Van Raay’s passion for clay and deep appreciation for craftsmanship was sparked by her father, who introduced her to pottery in 2016. Her grandmother was both a visual artist and a potter, inspiring her father to pursue ceramics and, in turn, passing that passion on to Van Raay.

Born in Japan, Van Raay moved to Canada at the age of five. Through her work, she explores the cultural experiences that have shaped her life, focusing on themes of nostalgia, identity and memory. She draws inspiration from childhood memories, often evoking feelings of innocence and optimism through her designs, processes and decorations. The language, culture and emotions tied to those experiences have shaped her perspective, prompting her to explore her upbringing through an adult lens and translate those memories into her ceramics. Embracing play as a design method, Van Raay aims to capture its essence throughout the making process. She embellishes and decorates her work both before and after glaze firing, allowing spontaneity and emotion to guide her creative process.

Marina was awarded and began her role as a Ceramics Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre on June 1, 2025.

Sydni Weatherson is a recent Sheridan College Craft and Design program graduate. Her time in the studio focused on blown glass as well as engraving. Weatherson’s current work captures the fluidity of the glass during the making process, exploring colour, texture and movement frozen in time. Outside the studio, she maintains a fine arts practice and is a hobbyist analog photographer.

Sydni was accepted as an Artist-in-Residence (Glass) at >Harbourfron Centre in 2022.

Omar Tarek Zayed is a Toronto-based textile artist and designer whose practice explores the relationship between traditional textile craft and contemporary design methodologies. Working primarily with natural dyeing, shibori, and silkscreen, he develops hybridized approaches to both womenswear and textile-based art.

In 2024, Omar graduated from OCAD University with a BDes in Material Art & Design. His thesis project, Henna Explorations: A Bridal Proposition, was exhibited during GRADEX 109 (2024) and received the Friends of Fiber Award.

He is a past recipient of the Artscape Daniels Launchpad Bursary (2021) and has participated in group exhibitions as part of the 2024 DesignTO Festival, including Tribute at Stantec Window Gallery and Art Intelligence: The Near Future of Art in Canada, co-presented by Gallery 1313, Partial Gallery, and DesignTO.

Omar is currently an Artist-in-Residence at Harbourfront Centre Textile Studio, where he is developing a new body of work that further investigates the technical and visual boundaries of natural dye work.