Lou Sheppard

Just living our best gay lives out here.

Beautiful Jewel died on Halloween. She was my constant companion for the past two years. Jewel came to us from @nunyahhh_____ and family for her country retirement. She was beloved by Sarah, Ilyas and Omar, and then was beloved by me and @pamelajeaniehart , and Ricki, Rudy and Joe. She loved to sleep in our arms and breathe her horrifying breath on us. I loved holding her. She made sounds like no other dog I’ve known and, as she aged, enjoyed being carried around the house and yard in our arms. She loved to play, she loved food and she loved the sun. We buried her next to Rizzo, her best dog friend, and in the spring we’ll plant a cherry tree to match the one we planted for Rizzo when she died. I’m so greatful to have known this gentle goofy loving dog spirit. I release her to this new moon. Now she’s a part of all of us. I miss her every day.

⚓️ ⛰ ANCHOR PROJECT FEATURE: 'Wandering Ground' by Germaine Koh (@germkoh ) & Lou Sheppard (@shep_shape ). For Nocturne 2025: GROUND, curated by Marite Kuus (@kuus.6 ). Wandering Ground is a an (anti)monument to public space: a mobile and flexible structure that calls on the multiple histories, potentials and possibilities that public space can signify. Set on a small triangle of land left unmown and fallow for the summer of 2025, Wandering Ground serves as a site of observation and interpretation, a mediating structure to engage with the city's soil and all that grows from it. Germaine Koh, based on the West Coast, has a 35-year art practice that adapts familiar situations, everyday actions and common spaces to consider the connections between people and various kinds of systems, both human and natural. She is largely concerned with human interactions and the technologies that connect these to our natural and built environments. Her work often draws connections between different phenomena and orders of activity. Lou Sheppard is a Canadian artist working in interdisciplinary audio, performance and installation based practice. Of settler ancestry, Sheppard was raised on unceded Mi'Kmaq territory in rural Nova Scotia. Sheppard first studied theatre at Concordia University in Montreal, and then graduated with a BFA in Interdisciplinary studies from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design. He has also studied English Literature and Education. Sheppard now lives on the South Shore of Nova Scotia/ Mi’kma’ki. 💡 This project was funded by the Halifax Regional Municipality (@hfxmoments ) 🫶 Special thanks to the Museum of Natural History (@mnhnovascotia ) for helping to make this Anchor Project happen. 📍Summer St & Veterans Memorial Lane 🗓️ Saturday, October 18th, 2025 for the 18th annual Nocturne Art at Night Festival, curated by Marite Kuus. 📷 Images by Greg Ellison (@g.ellisonmedia ) and Neil Kehler (@kneilius ) 🔗 Visit nocturnehalifax.ca to learn more! #nochfx25 #kjipuktuk #halifax #art #artatnight

Some images from our realization of Wandering Ground last night at Nocturne Halifax. Over the night Lou performed interpretations of the mound, with the text decomposing over the course of the night. Meanwhile, Germaine sewed pieces of scrap textiles to the emerging dazzle camouflage pattern on our structure. Dye expert Izzy @mainlyghostly spent all night dying these scraps with local plants. Thanks to the @nocturnehalifax team including Signy Holm @signy.holm , led by Melany Nugent Noble, and curated this year by Marite Kuus @kuus.6 .

Monument comes from monere, which means ‘to remember’ but also ‘to warn’ and ‘to advise.’ Admonish, monitor, and premonition also come from this latin root. . The ground is generally considered to be contaminated- not only from the daily pollutants of urban life, but also from chemicals that remain in the soil from the Halifax Explosion. This makes any engagement with soil difficult, both from a perspective of safety and bureaucracy. . When something is so large and confusing it becomes difficult to see, and then becomes invisible. . What happens when nothing is happening? What grows when nothing is grown? . . . Wandering Ground Lou Sheppard and Germaine Koh . . Project at @nocturnehalifax 2025

Uhhh oops. So, we don’t have a venue yet for Kjipuktuk Chorus. Stay tuned city choristers. We’re working on it. We’ll send out the information to you asap by email and will post here. If you want to be sure not to miss out make sure you go to foreverchorus.ca and sign up for our email lists. South Shore- we’re locked in to start on the 30th of September. 🧳 And…on this note- if anyone has a line on an accessible space that could hold 50+ people in the city (preferably North End or on a reliable bus line) please send us a message. Love you sorry

Edit! Kjipuktuk chorus date and time tba! Happy Fall Forever Choristers. Instead of our usual Registration only season we are hosting an open sing each month. No registrations necessary, sliding scale door fee open to all queers and our allies! We will meet up, warm up, learn a round and then learn a whole song together. Around halfway through, we will break for tea and treats and chats. 🍂 Doors 6:30-9:00pm wrap up! $10-$30 sliding scale free to anyone that is un waged and without external resources Cash or card some merch available :) 🐛 South Shore: at the Lahave fire hall September 30 October 21 November 18 December 16 🍂 Kjipuktuk: date and Venue TBA 🦌 Winter/Spring season February to May 2026 registrations open in November

𝗢𝗣𝗧𝗜𝗖𝗔 𝗫 𝗠𝗢𝗠𝗘𝗡𝗧𝗔 Jusqu’au 18 octobre 2025, découvrez les expositions de 𝗣𝗮𝘂𝗹 𝗦𝗲𝗲𝘀𝗲𝗾𝘂𝗮𝘀𝗶𝘀 et de 𝗟𝗼𝘂 𝗦𝗵𝗲𝗽𝗽𝗮𝗿𝗱 à 𝗢𝗣𝗧𝗜𝗖𝗔. 📅 : 𝗢𝗣𝗧𝗜𝗖𝗔 vous accueille du mardi au samedi de 12h à 17h. 📍 : 5445 avenue de Gaspé, #106 Venez en grand nombre, les entrées sont gratuites ! ______________ 𝗢𝗣𝗧𝗜𝗖𝗔 𝗫 𝗠𝗢𝗠𝗘𝗡𝗧𝗔 Until October 18, 2025, discover the exhibitions of 𝗣𝗮𝘂𝗹 𝗦𝗲𝗲𝘀𝗲𝗾𝘂𝗮𝘀𝗶𝘀 and 𝗟𝗼𝘂 𝗦𝗵𝗲𝗽𝗽𝗮𝗿𝗱 at 𝗢𝗣𝗧𝗜𝗖𝗔. 📅 : 𝗢𝗣𝗧𝗜𝗖𝗔 welcomes you Tuesday to Saturday from 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. 📍 : 5445 Av. de Gaspé, #106 Come one, come all, admission is free! ______________ 🎥 : Olivier Gilbert & Souligna Koumphonphakdy

⚓︎ ANCHOR PROJECT ⌗101: Wandering Ground, by Lou Sheppard and Germaine Koh 📍Museum of Natural History / Wanderers Lawn 🗓️ Saturday, October 18, 6PM - Midnight Wandering Ground is a an (anti)monument to public space: a mobile and flexible structure that calls on the multiple histories, potentials and possibilities that public space can signify. Set on a small triangle of land left unmown and fallow for the summer of 2025, Wandering Gound serves as a site of observation and interpretation, a mediating structure to engage with the city’s soil and all that grows from it. 🔗 To learn more about this project, the artist, and to check out Nocturne’s full 2025 festival schedule visit nocturnehalifax.ca #nochfx25 #kjipuktuk #halifax #art #artatnight

Rights of Passage is now on @centre_optica for @momentabiennale much love to @breattlejuice for creating these incredible river bank furnitures and @mainlyghosty for dyeing them with local plants. As always in awe of @wayne.burns @tess_martens and @kingchella for their incredible performances to @pamelajeaniehart for sound, music, performance and everything else. And to everyone else who lent their labour and love to this work. I’m so glad to see it out in the world again, especially with its own river in the gallery that responds to the bass frequencies in the sound. The future is collaborative and the future is queer.

RIGHTS OF PASSAGE a performance by Lou Sheppard and Pamela Hart as a preamble to the opening of Lou’s eponymous exhibition at @centre_optica Thank you warmly @shep_shape and @pamelajeaniehart for this beautiful collective moment in the clearing of Champ des Possibles ❤️🤲🏽❤️ Produced by MOMENTA in partnership with OPTICA For « In Praise of the Missing Image » curated by @marieannyemsi

RIGHTS OF PASSAGE By Lou Sheppard 🔛exhibition opening at 5pm today @centre_optica Performance at 5:30pm today at Champ des Possibles ( 50m from the art center) Rights of Passage is a drag opera presented as an immersive sound and video installation. @shep_shape stages Hogweed, Turkeytail, and Algae, three hybrid figures wandering through the lost, buried, or compromised waterways of Greater Toronto. The exhibition, which also includes sculptural elements inspired by plants and fungi from the St. Lawrence River, explores the right of access to riverbanks, now impeded by privatization. Through a script composed by artificial intelligence and edited by Sheppard, the work orchestrates points of queer emergence, where unclear boundaries between city and nature, past and future, access and intrusion allow us to imagine other paths toward common ground. Exhibition produced by MOMENTA in partnership with OPTICA. Curator: @marieannyemsi This exhibition is commissioned by AGYU in Toronto, funded by Canada Council for the Arts and made possible thanks to the support of OBORO 🔛Sept 5-Oct 18,2025