As part of our Canada Day Celebrations in Historic Markerville, Stuart McKay will share a poetry reading on the courtyard stage, including “Canada” by Stephan G. Stephansson, and one of his own original poems. Begins at 3:00 pm.

I am a Calgary/Edmonton based poet. My fourth book of poetry, “the commune of our waking” was published in 2024 by AOS Publishing of Montreal. Community involvement is a major concern of my artistic practice. To that end, I serve on the Board of Directors for the League of Canadian poets, and serve on the poetry editorial collective of filling station. As well, I am a writer on the margins. I live with a permanent disability - learning and visual - and am a recipient of Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped from the Alberta Government.

During my residency, I will continue work on two writing projects. “bohemia, with a twist of lemon, please” and “celadon in tonality”.

“bohemia, with a twist of lemon, please” is a long poem memoir, examining the relationship between my disability, my poetic life, and my faith life.How have my experiences as a disabled person affected, and influenced my growth as a poet? How does my Christian faith influence and affect my understanding of disability, my aesthetic practice? “bohemia, with a twist of lemon, please” is not a religious tract; nor is it a guidebook on disability politics, or a document of personal poetic personal history. I wish to go deeper than surface considerations, and ask difficult questions about the nature of disability. How and in what manner does the experience of living with a disability lead to an aesthetic sensibility? Does a life of faith mean resisting or embracing the rigours, joys and challenges of disability, of a life dedicated to creativity?

“celadon in tonality” elaborates on my belief that poetry is a form of memory. “celadon in tonality” examines how the material world delivers memory through, for example, an encounter with a work of art, a ceramic cup, a piece of music. In one of the long poems in the series, I imagine a child touring an art gallery featuring the work of the Regina Rive group of artists. He hears the music of the Vancouver composer, Barbara Pentland, play in the background. He remembers this experience years later when he hears the music again. Another long poem is concerned with the Soviet Venera probes to Venus in the 1970s and 1980s. How can a long poem memorialise the event? A long poem about the time-defying power, and meditative possibilities suggested within ceramics will also feature in the series.

While in residency, Lisa Meuser plans to research, write, and develop the first draft of a play or long-form monologue cycle titled "Freydís: Daughter of Fire." Freydís Eiríksdóttir, the daughter of Erik the Red, is a woman remembered only through conflicting male-authored sagas. She is powerful and polarizing, and yet rarely discussed beyond a footnote. The work will examine how history chooses its heroes, how women are written and rewritten depending on who controls the narrative, and what might happen if Freydís could speak for herself.

My family has always told me that we are related to Erik the Red, and while that ancestry was never formally documented, the oral history ignited a lifelong fascination with Icelandic stories. Freydís, in particular, has stayed with me—a woman remembered only through conflicting male-authored sagas. She is powerful and polarizing, and yet rarely discussed beyond a footnote. This residency will give me the space to reclaim her voice and explore the emotional truth behind her fragmented legacy. 

At Fensala Hall on Wednesday, June 24, she will share her process for and progress on this new work, including a reading and a writing component that participants can work on or use to inspire their own work.

​A day of community, history and Canadian pride!
WEDNESDAY, JULY 1ST, 2026

• MINI MARKET 10:00 am - 3:00 pm
Vendors in attendance:
* Soul Spark * Bea's Creations * Hanna's Designs * Dianna Steer Arts * SGSIS
• BBQ LUNCH for purchase Noon - 3:00 pm
• Special Canada Day POEM READING 3:00 pm
by Artist in Residence STUART McKAY
and more!
• Complimentary CANADA DAY CAKE 3:00 pm, while supplies last!
To close the day...
• FREE CONCERT starting at 3:30 pm
with MARY ANNE MESSAGE

Celebrate where the past comes to life and traditions come together.
* Sponsored in part by Red Deer County *

During their residency at the Buttermaker’s House, Christine Bray and Cathy Scott look forward to connecting with the Markerville community while continuing their work on their collaborative legacy project.  As they deepen their knowledge of their Icelandic heritage, they are weaving together their paintings, prose and poetry into a book format for future publication; to be able to share with their families, friends and future generations.

Both Cathy and Christine plan to be out and about during their week-long residency, looking for inspiration for painting and writing and they welcome anyone interested to bring their pencils or paints and join in or just come along to share in the experience.

On Saturday, June 13, they will be contributing to the Icelandic Independence Day festivities. Cathy will be on the courtyard stage showing her art and leading our group painting project. Christine will guide a poetry writing challenge, plus share a poetry reading as part of the Fjallkona crowning ceremony.

Christine Rolf-Bray
Christine was obsessed with reading and writing poetry as a girl and was further inspired when she was told she was distantly related to a famous Icelandic poet- Stephan G. Stephanson.  As an adult, she made her career as a litigation paralegal, and all creative urges to use rhyme or alliteration were squashed as the job demanded purely factual writing.

She is now retired and has embarked on a journey to connect with her creative side once again. Together with her sister Cathy Scott, they are developing a legacy project about their Icelandic heritage through paintings, poetry and the written word. They hope to engage with the residents and visitors of Markerville during their week-long residency in June with questions and conversations in connection with their project, with a long-term goal of publishing their completed work. 

Cathy Scott
My Happy Place...is painting and drawing anywhere/anytime, especially when accompanied by a like-minded group of artists on a plein air painting adventure. I am passionate about the process and power of making meaningful art! Seeing and experiencing the world through artist’s eyes is truly a blessing!

As great grand daughters of the Jon Benediktsson/Olafsson and Lara Strong/Jonnson families of Markerville and Iceland, my sister Christine Bray, and I are very honored and excited to be taking part in the Buttermaker’s House Residency, as we continue our search for information and understanding of our Icelandic heritage. It is our goal to create and present a cohesive and personal legacy project through our paintings, prose and poetry. We hope to explore our connections to place and people while staying in Markerville June 11 – 17 and share our works-in-progress, when possible, with those who are interested. I can also offer an impromptu plein air painting demo if desired.

Do you enjoy crafts and painting? Do you know someone who loves bouncy castles and face painting? Are you or your family/friends/co-workers looking for a fun way to spend a day whirling giving a little bit back to the community? Well, have we got a deal for you! 

On June 13, Historic Markerville will stage one of its main cultural events in the Creamery Courtyard. The Icelandic Independence Day celebration is fun for the whole family. And, in order for it to be successful, we need some help with a few things:

🛠️ SETTING UP and decorating the Courtyard Saturday morning (the more the merrier) - helping set up a few tents, rearranging tables, and hanging some flags

✂️ CRAFT TABLE ATTENDANTS (2) - assisting kids and adults with a few crafty things 

🎭 FACE PAINTING (2)

🏰 BOUNCY CASTLE ATTENDANTS (2) - ensuring safety precautions are adhered to

🖌️ PAINTING HELPER (1) - assisting our artist-in-residence with a large, community painting project

If you can help, please email [email protected] and let us know what you'd like to help with.

Signy Holm is an artist living in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Her research-based and archeological-inspired practice focuses on the interconnectedness and lifecycle of various materials, and the inseparability of ‘nature’ and the synthetic or human-made world. Most recently she is interested in plastic pollution and its connection to fossil fuels in Alberta. She is the recipient of the ARTS Graduate Research Award (2026) for her master’s thesis, Wayfinding Through Waste: A Collective, Living Archive of Coastal Plastic. Signy is always looking for ways that art can help us engage with social and ecological issues within our communities. She sees her work as highly interdisciplinary, with crossovers between science, ecology and the social sciences, usually with a twinge of humour and playfulness!

Originally from Calgary, Alberta, Rakel Holm has a Bachelor of Environmental Studies with a minor in biology from the University of Manitoba, and is currently completing her Master of Science at the University of Winnipeg. Her thesis research examines the impacts of oil spills on ecologically, culturally, historically, and economically significant Red River Métis sites and resources. Working in partnership with the Manitoba Métis Federation (MMF), her research combines Métis knowledge with conventional scientific methods, including geospatial analysis, in order to develop an Oil Spill Risk Assessment (OSRA) for freshwater environments in Manitoba. 

DESCRIPTION OF RESIDENCY ACTIVITIES:
Signy and Rakel will spend their week investigating the shores of the Medicine River and Tindastoll Creek through walking, mapping, collecting and documenting objects through various creative interventions. Rakel, an environmental studies graduate student studying the ecology of freshwater ecosystems, and Signy, an interdisciplinary artist focusing on the interconnectedness of the natural and synthetic world, often within the context of shorelines, will be working together for the first time. 

They will also be researching the history of Markerville as an Icelandic settlement and its common threads with their paternal roots in the New Iceland region of Manitoba. Both regions, as well as Iceland, are deeply connected to bodies of water, something that  both sisters are passionate about in their work.