The point of the dewy web composed mostly of space and potential to which, in a fit of anthropocentric preoccupation, we might attribute, as if ‘he’ were the ‘author’ of anything, works of poetry, installation art, and film like the correct fury of your why is a mountain (Gordon Hill Press, 2021), six feet | between us (McIntosh Gallery, 2022), in medias res (Westland Gallery, 2023), and mo(u)vements. (Astoria Pictures, Rose Garden Press, 2023), Kevin Andrew Heslop is a crop-rotating transience through which the chapbooks the rules of grammar will not save you at the hour of your death (with Roxanna Bennett, Baseline Press, 2024), Human Voices Wake Us (with P.F. Tego and Taylor Marie Graham, Rose Garden Press, 2024), Can/adian Re/pair Stories (with Dr. Alissa Centivany, Canadian Repair Convention, 2024), and even if the light on the horizon is a forest fire i love a phoenix (Shab-e She'r, 2024) lately found cause to spring, and from which the books The Writing on the Wind’s Wall: Dialogues about 'Medical Assistance in Dying' (The Porcupine's Quill, 2025), First Do No Harm: Ten Years as a Death Doctor (with Dr. Ian Ball and Robert Sibbald, TBD, 2026), and a two-volume compendium of conversations first published with Amphora, Centred Magazine, The Devil's Artisan, The Miramichi Reader, Parrot Art, and The /temz/ Review [Guernica Editions, 2027 (volume one) & 2028 (volume two)], alongside a fervid array of works, composed mostly of space and potential, for the stage, screen, and gallery, are, as if in temporary occlusion of the present moment the future existed, forthcoming, as are new poems with The Fiddlehead, a journal whose namesake invoked in Heslop's mind preoccupation with his own umbilicus.
In meatspace a pantheistic animist of lay-Buddhist practice born Canadian to Celtic and Viking ancestry, Heslop (b. 1992) was born and raised where Deshkan Ziibi forks unceded through London Township Treaty territory; and having trained as a percussionist under Rob Larose and as an actor under the late Ian Watson in Stratford, Ontario and M.J. Kidnie in Stratford-upon-Avon and London, England via Western University, where he acted in student plays, wrote acerbically for the student daily, and published poetry, Heslop been tremendously fortunate to accept residencies in Belgrade, Serbia with Belgrade Art Studio (May, 2023); Hämeenkyrö, Finland with Arteles Centre for Creativity (June, 2023); Châteauneuf-sur-Charente, France with BRAŻŻA (July, 2023); Ilhabela, Brazil with Casa Na Ilha (Nov-Dec 2023); Boiçucanga, Brazil with Kaaysá Artist Residency (Dec-Apr, 2024); Ebeltoft, Denmark with Earthwise Residency (June, 2024); Viborg, Denmark with Ørslev Kloster (July, 2024); Fuji, Japan with SaikoNeon (Aug-Sept, 2024); and São Paulo, Brazil with Teatro Oficina (Jan-April, 2025). His current posts include Deputy Chair of the Board with Changing Ways, Host with Parrot Talks, Contributing Editor with Centred Magazine, Interviewer in Residence with The Miramichi Reader, Extraliterary Liaison with Gordon Hill Press/The Porcupine's Quill, and Founding Director with Astoria Pictures.
'His' current work (as of November 2024) includes a prose-poetry travelogue; representation of outstanding IP from Canadian publishers and independent authors for adaptation to the stage and screen at IP Market Day; Parrot Talks, a biweekly podcast with artists from around the world; a Parrot Art series of dialogues with leading professionals in the arts world designed to equip emerging talents with the know-how to pursue careers in the arts; a book of dialogues on the subject of right-to-repair (in collaboration with Dr. Alissa Centivany and photographer Derek Boswell); a seven-episode docuseries (writer-director) on the subject of individualism®'s keenest means-justifying end, What Is Choice?; the verbatim-theatre adaptation of The Writing on the Wind's Wall: Dialogues about 'Medical Assistance in Dying' (in collaboration with playwright Camille Intson and producer Sid Wilson); post-production on the Montréal-based comedy series (writer-director) Some Things Are Too Important to Take Seriously and Art Is One of Those Things starring Monika Schneider and featuring cinematographer Ivan Melicoff; the comedy series (writer-director) News That Stays News with executive oversight by producer-director Greg Hemmings; and a feature-length biopic (writer-director) about Zè Celso with support from Teatro Oficina.