Ashley Diana Culver

Ashley Diana Culver (b. 1986) is a queer artist and writer based in Tkaronto/Toronto. Attention with care runs through her practice, manifesting as sculpture, photography, artist books, community-engaged and food-related projects. Written work functions as a grounding medium to record ephemeral projects and as a way to release thoughts and research. Her work is in conversation with domestic space and desire for connection. 

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She is also a butcher and a chef who has cooked at a children’s camp, in fine-dining restaurants, and run a meal program in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. 

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From 2015-2020, after completing a MFA from York University (2015), Culver ran the apartment gallery, Sea Foam, that encouraged a porousness between life and art by inviting local artists to exhibit in her home. Culver presented her paper Sea Foam: a personal account of an alternative gallery at the Bibliotheque Kandinsky, Centre Pompidou in Paris. She writes the column ‘Alt-Arts' for Cornelia Magazine, profiling alternative art spaces in Toronto and the people who make them. Culver also is the creator of Soupy Club.

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She has published articles with West End Phoenix, C Magazine, and CBC Arts, among others. Culver has participated in residencies at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, Vermont Studio Center, and Est-Nord-Est résidence d’artistes. She gratefully acknowledges support from the Canada Council of the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council and the Toronto Arts Council. 

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Currently, she is writing her debut book about the meaning of the objects we surround ourselves with, the domestic life of a lesbian couple, the daily routines of being an artist while working as a cook, and understanding time is finite.