Daniel Innes and Christina Wong

My guests on this episode are Daniel Innes and Christina Wong. Daniel is an artist whose work includes painting, art installation, graphic and textile design, and illustration. He currently divides his time between Toronto and an artist residency in Hyōgo, Japan. Christina is an author, playwright, and multidisciplinary artist whose plays have been performed at Factory Studio, Theatre Passe Muraille Backspace, and the Palmerston Library Theatre, and whose writing has appeared in TOK Magazine and the Toronto Star. Daniel and Christina’s first book collaboration is the graphic novel Denison Avenue, which was published by ECW Press in 2023 and was a finalist on Canada Reads and for a Carnegie Medal for Excellence through the American Library Association. In its review of the book, The New York Journal of Books said that “as Chinatowns all over the country become gentrified and disappear, Denison Avenue provides an important reminder of what is being lost.” 

Daniel and Christina and I talk about the shock of their book’s success, about getting advice on surviving the Canada Reads experience from former Calgary mayor Naheed Nenshi, and about changing up their creative process for their next collaboration, currently in the works.

This podcast is produced and hosted by Nathan Whitlock, in partnership with The Walrus.

Music: "simple-hearted thing" by Alex Lukashevsky. Used with permission.