March 19–May 9, 2026
Opening Reception: Friday March 20, 7–10pm
Reave Dennison is a photographer and gelatin silver printmaker who documents maritime and forestry labour in the Pacific Northwest. Tree Work presents a selection of new black and white analogue photographs that Dennison took while working as a beachcomber, sawyer and arborist over the past five years. The images portray the environments, people, material culture and technical craft of these disciplines. Dennison focuses his camera on the conditions he works in, so that he can shoot candidly and intimately.
Forestry is a primary industry in British Columbia, comprising hundreds of responsibilities and skill sets. Yet there is relatively little familiarity with the roles that these people play in the regional economy and its culture; their relationships to the environments they live and work in; or the impact that shifting political, ecological and technological conditions have on their lives and the social fabric of the province. Dennison’s images offer a glimpse into these contexts and experiences.
Dennison is attentive to analogue photographic processes. He shoots in small, medium and large film formats; then develops and prints his negatives in a darkroom that he built. He also hand milled and constructed the wood frames that the works are presented in.
Pale Fire will also release Dennison’s first photography book, Under 60 tons this spring. Co-designed and co-produced with Information Office, the book features over 90 photographs that he took while working as a crew member aboard small, versatile tug boats, which are classified as ‘under 60 gross tons’. These boats are being retired by companies in favour of larger, more stream lined vessels to comply with the tightening of Transport Canada regulations. Dennison’s photographs capture crew members who navigate marine machinery, infrastructure and the elements, including hands on chart work, compass work and manual labour. Many of these skills and duties are being rendered obsolete by technology. Dennison observes and reflects on this industrial and cultural transition.
Reave Dennison is a photographer living and working on Mayne Island, British Columbia. Actively working within the trades, his primary focus is documenting labour in the Pacific Northwest. He recently presented his project Under 60 Tons at the Maritime Museum of British Columbia, Victoria (2025), the Vancouver Maritime Museum (2023) and the Gibson’s Public Art Gallery (2022). A forthcoming artist book of this project is being co-published by Pale Fire and Information Office (2026).
Under 60 tons is co-published with Information Office and generously supported by the Canada Council for the Arts, British Columbia Arts Council, John & Helen O’Brian, Jane Irwin & Ross Hill, and Claudia Beck.
