(On defining “home.”) “It’s where you feel safest and you feel the most yourself. It’s the place that you create or you create with other people. And it’s the place where you maintain that peace and tranquility. Purposefully.” – Simone Collins
Simone Collins is a Toronto based artist, artist’s assistant, barista, wife, and dog owner. Before the pandemic hit, Simone was making her own art out of her home studio but going into a studio in Toronto’s Junction area to work for artist Cybèle Young, while Simone’s husband went to work as an elementary school teacher. Since the pandemic, Simone’s home has transformed from being her living and creative space to also being her workspace and her husband’s virtual classroom. The conversation centres around ideas of “home” and how those ideas are reflected in Simone’s work as well as how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected the way that others, and even Simone herself, perceive the various themes in her work.
Simone Collins is interviewed by Sammy Van Herk.