Nancy Shaw was an award-winning poet, scholar, art critic, and curator. Author of Affordable Tedium(1991), and Scoptocratic (1992), Shaw frequently collaborated with poet Catriona Strang, with whom she also co-authored two books of poetry: Busted (2001) and Cold Trip (2006). Shaw received a Doctorate of Philosophy in Communications from McGill University in 2000 and held a post-doctoral fellowship at New York University. Her doctoral dissertation, “Modern Art, Media Pedagogy, Cultural Citizenship: The Museum Of Modern Art’s Television Project, 1952-1955,” was judged as a superior work. Just prior to her death in 2007, she was engaged in new research on McLuhan and the visual arts. During the 1980s in Vancouver, she was at the centre of interdisciplinary collaborations, contributing as a writer, artist, curator, and critic. She was co-editor of the influential Writing magazine, and was co-director of The Kootenay School of Writing.
A founding member of the Institute for Domestic Research, and former member of the Kootenay School of Writing collective, Catriona Strang is the author of "Low Fancy" and co-author with the late Nancy Shaw of "Busted" and "Light Sweet Crude". She frequently collaborates with composer Jacqueline Leggatt and clarinetist François Houle. She lives in Vancouver, where she and her two kids are active in the local home learning community.
