Early Works « Visual Montage

One of a collection of squatter houses on the Maplewood Mudflats in North Vancouver, British Columbia. The inter-tidal area had long been an artist’s, writer’s, free spirit’s colony but controversial because it was below the high tide mark so therefore ‘free’ land. Finally in 1971 the District of North Vancouver moved in and condemned the houses for health reasons. On the day I took this photo bulldozers had arrived to demolish the houses but protesters caused a temporary delay. A few months later all the houses were burned down ending an interesting part of Vancouver history. Malcolm Lowry wrote Under the Volcano in a nearby cabin in the 1950’s.