Discipline Category: Writing and Publishing

Natalie Mark 麥月明 is a local Winnipeg/Treaty 1 illustrator and cartoonist.

In 2023-4, Natalie received an award for emerging cartoonists and made a comic for CAKE Chicago. They have also facilitated various community and public art projects for Winnipeg’s Chinatown, and run many art and comics workshops in Winnipeg and beyond including the Snoopy and the Red Baron traveling exhibit from the Charles M. Schulz Museum, at VanCAF in Vancouver, and MICE in Boston.

Natalie’s comics are somewhere between a reflection of life and small curiosities. Their work plays with myth-making and whimsical fantasies projected onto social realism. Storytelling is Natalie's primary tool for understanding themselves and exploring the world around them.

When they are not drawing, Natalie loves going to their local library, playing TTRPGs, and going on picnics! Visit their site: https://nataliemark.ca or follow along with their art journey @floodkiss across the internet.

I am an Ojibwe-Cree actor, writer, director, music producer, and program manager dedicated to Indigenous storytelling. My journey began at the Nor’West Community Centre in Winnipeg, where early exposure to the arts ignited a lifelong passion for performance and creative expression.

On screen, I’ve appeared in short films including Don’t Look @ Me (Sean Kinsella) and Unless You Have Been There (Farrah Murdock), the feature Aberdeen (Ryan Cooper & Eva Thomas), and Season 3 of the series Acting Good (APTN/CTV Comedy).

My directorial debut, Stay Awhile, created through the Skodoodisden Project, screened internationally at the Red Nation International Film Festival (Los Angeles), Pocahontas Reframed Film Festival (Richmond, VA), and across Turtle Island.

Behind the scenes, my career has spanned cinema operations, legal work as a Trademark Paralegal, and leadership roles in film organizations. I currently serve as Program Manager for the Winnipeg Indigenous Filmmakers Collective (WIFC) and as Education & Outreach Coordinator for the Winnipeg Film Group (WFG).

In 2025, I graduated from the National Screen Institute’s CBC New Indigenous Voices program, where I worked as Assistant Director on Rezervations for Two and later joined Eagle Vision as an Office PA. That same year, I became a proud member of ACTRA.

I continue to balance acting, writing, and directing with a commitment to fostering spaces where Indigenous voices can thrive and be represented authentically on screen.

In 2012, I graduated from The University of British Columbia with a BFA in Creative Writing. Since then, my written work has been published in Canadian anthologies and literary magazines such as onecoolword, CV2, Prairie Fire, Poetry is Dead, The Winnipeg Free Press, and Oratorealis.

While attending classes at UBC, I was introduced to spoken word and performance poetry through the Vancouver Poetry Slam community and my writing was forever changed. Since moving back home to Winnipeg in Treaty One Territory, I’ve built a presence in the local community as a fixture on stage at the Winnipeg Poetry Slam where I am also its co-artistic director.

As the former Winnipeg Individual Slam Champion, Grand Slam Champion, and Uniter 30 Favourite Writer, I’ve featured on stages at local writers, spoken word, improv and fringe festivals – the latter for which I’ve produced multiple engaging shows. I’ve also toured the nation, featuring on various community and festival stages like the Canadian Festival of Spoken Word, The Victoria Spoken Word Festival, and The Saskatoon Poetic Arts Festival.

As a mentor I’ve facilitated various groups and workshops via programs with The Manitoba Council for International Cooperation, Creative Manitoba, The Manitoba Writers Guild, and Poetry in Voice, and have developed lesson plans for classroom residencies with the Manitoba Arts Council’s Artists in Schools Program, where I empower students to explore their self-expression and community building through spoken word poetry.