Name: Tiare Boyes
Occupation: Leeward Consulting Ltd. (Owner/Operator)
Camps: Arts for Ecology, Youth Empowerment (8-12)
About Tiare: Tiare is a 2nd generation Canadian commercial fisher from Vancouver Island B.C. She is employed on the fishing vessel, Borealis I and has worked for her father’s small, family run business, Arbegar Fishing Co. Ltd. since she was 12. With eighteen years experience working at sea in the British Columbia Integrated Groundfish Industry, she is also a Canadian delegate serving on the Conference Board for the International Pacific Halibut Commission. At the age of 12 Tiare took her first SCUBA lesson and continued her dive training at Pearson Collage. In 2012 she completed her PADI Divemaster and Rescue Diver certifications and began working in the dive industry. Since 2016 Tiare has represented her family’s fishing company as a youth delegate on the Private Sector Mechanism (PSM) to the Committee on World Food Security (CFS) through the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). In 2017, Tiare was a youth in agriculture panellist and presented on Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 14, life below the water, at the High Level Political Forum (HLPF) at the UN in New York.
Tiare has recently completed her Masters in Marine and Resource Management specializing in Coastal and Marine Management, through the University of Akureyri in Ísafjörður, Iceland. Her thesis investigated spatial shifts and potential avoidance fishing behaviours of the B.C. halibut fleet in the presence of choke species.
What do you love about Vargas?
I love the forest on Vargas, how you can be swallowed up in the salal and the cedar trees so that the rest of the world feels very far away. I also love the rocky coastline with all the tenacious intertidal life clinging to the crevasses.
What medium do you create in?
I am an underwater photographer but I also love to paint and to play the ukulele.
What role do you think art plays in environmental stewardship?
Art can help to communicate key values of environmental stewardship and may help foster an understanding and respect for our natural world.
How do you make change on the individual/community/global scale?
First you must be true to who you are and ensure you take care of needs, once you have filled your cup, then you can concentrate on filling others. This applies to your community and our global community as well; change may start very small in our little individual corners of the world, then it can begin to grow from there. As long as you are striving to make your little corner of the world, no matter how small, a better place, you are making positive change in this world.
What inspires you?
Fish! The endless adaptations and niches marine life has evolved (and continues) to fill absolutely captivates me. Bullkelp also has a special place in my heart as the most beautiful of all algaes, I am endlessly inspired by bullkelp.
What are you most excited for about summer camps?
I am excited to meet the campers, to spend some time amongst some passionate people and to share a little bit of the underwater world I love to spend time in.
How do you define empowerment?
Empowerment as applied to myself was finally owning who I am and discovering I have an interesting story to tell. Empowerment can also come from helping hold others up so that they can use their voice to tell their story. Finally empowerment is knowledge, whatever you choose to study, the more you learn the more empowered we all become together.
For more information about our Arts For Ecology or to secure a spot before we fill up visit: https://www.cedarcoastfieldstation.org/arts-for-ecology-camp/