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Meet the Carvers!
The ice used for the sculptures at the East Coast Credit Union Ice Festival is specially made for carving. We source the ice from the amazing Ice Creation - the only producers of ice carving ice in the Atlantic region. The ice is frozen from bottom up to avoid cracks, creating a crystal-clear canvas for carving. They bring the ice to Downtown Dartmouth from Caraquet, N.B. in a freezer truck. This special ice requires talented carvers to turn the ice into masterpieces. Meet our carvers below.
Patrick Brunet
Prince Edward Island
For 15 years working as a site manager for winter events, Patrick Brunet has always enjoyed supporting artists. Now he has moved into the realm of 'the artist' himself. Over the last handful of years he has carved for multiple events including Canada Winter Games and the Jack Frost Winter Festival. He is excited to keep working and improving as ice is a beautiful and magical medium. Patrick trained as a woodworker in Montreal and explored working in various blue collar employs such as carpentry and commercial fishing. By blending this education and work he arrives at a very flexible niche of designing and managing events and outdoor art installations. In his spare time he is an avid fossil hunter and enjoys training in JiuJitsu.
Richard Chaisson
New Brunswick
Richard Chaisson is a renowned ice artist based out of New Brunswick. He also happens to be the owner of Ice Création Ltd, who provides the 300-pound ice blocks for the Festival. Richard is a chef by day as a recently retired instructor at the culinary school, CCNB Acadian Peninsula. Ice carving started as a hobby, and he now has decades of ice carving experience. Many of his ice carving tools, he has created himself by adapting other types of tools, often ones made for wood carving. His experience and knowledge are intriguing, and he never fails to impress.
Denzil Barkley
Nova Scotia
Denzil Barkley is joining us at the East Coast Credit Union Ice Festival for the first time this year! He is a self-taught ice carver, who learned the art through YouTube videos and trying out different techniques. We are thrilled to have Denzil and his talents join us.
Darren Hudson
Nova Scotia
Darren Hudson, 7-time World Champion Log Roller, and owner of the Timber Lounge. Enjoys carving as a way to satisfy creative desire. He has spent time with top carvers in the world but will be the first to admit he’s not one of them. While Darren doesn’t consider himself a top carver on the world stage, he still enjoys putting on a great show. Darren’s performance will not disappoint!
Rob Milner
Nova Scotia
Rob Milner is the Owner of Eternity Chainsaw Carvings and resides in Brooklyn by Liverpool. He is a multi-award winning wood and ice carver who exists to make sculptural art and is absolutely stoked to be able to participate yet again in Downtown Dartmouth Ice Festival for all to enjoy!
Chandana Kapila
Nova Scotia
Meet Chandana Kapila. Originally from Sri Lanka, Chan made his way to Canada and is now a very successful chef! Chan is currently the Executive Sous Chef at The Port Pub & Bistro in Port Williams, Nova Scotia. He is magnificent in the kitchen and with carving! He creates masterpieces on more than just ice, he won Best Display at Kentville's Soup Fest 2023 in support of the Community Soup Kitchen. Chan's creativity and attention to detail makes for a fascinating show.
Mat Nuqingaq & Claude Roussel
Nunavut & Nova Scotia
Claude Roussel is an artist based in Prospect, Nova Scotia whose art is heavily influenced by the environment around him. Claude spent 12 years in Nunavut where he worked closely with artist Mathew Nuqingaq, who you can read about below. Together, along with other artists, Mathew and Claude built and ran a collaborative studio where they worked together to elevate their art. *Fun fact* Claude and Mathew were on the same team for a snow sculpture contest in Nunavut in 2010, where they had less than 24 hours to create a masterpiece!
Mathew Nuqingaq is a multi-talented artist and educator from Iqaluit, Nunavut. To name a few of his talents, he is a sculptor, drum dancer, photographer, and founder of The Aayurra Studio. Mat has worked to create & promote Inuit art for over 20 years, and his studio has become a space to do just that. He travels to bring his talents to the Downtown Dartmouth Ice Festival presented by East Coast Credit Union and to reconnect with his long-time friend, Claude Roussel – who is another carver in the festival!
Joel Palmer
New Brunswick
Joel Palmer is the Owner/Operator of Swamp Bear Art. With close to a decade of carving as a professional, Joel has become recognized as a top sculptor. His work has been featured many times in both national news and magazines. Joel was selected to be a participant on Discovery TV series A Cut Above - a popular chainsaw carving series. Over the years, Joel has worked on a variety of subjects for his clients, and his work can be found here, there, and everywhere. Joel currently lives in New Brunswick in the small town of Browns Flat. Having carved with some of the best sculptors in the world, Joel strives for excellence and quality in all of his work. One of his favourite ways to create is in the moment, off the top of his head and seeking the energy in each piece of wood or ice to reveal its inner hidden beauty as it reveals itself.
Robin Parker
Nova Scotia
Robin Parker is a local Dartmouth artist that is dedicated to community, and is excited to show off his talents to the local community!
Gordon Sparks
New Brunswick
My name is Gordon Sparks, my clan mother is the beaver, clan spirit animal the bear, born from the Turtle River, and the salmon is our clan dotem, raised in Pabineau First Nation, now living in Rough Waters N.B. Canada. The traditional hand-carved wooden mask has taken me on a vision path that is
guiding my mind, body, and spirit to seek knowledge and wisdom of the Mi'kmaw people’s stories, traditional ceremonies, traditional food, and medicine. Each mask that I make is from my life story, and
the people of Mi’kma’ki. Each mask, has a personal story on how I was guided
to find the tree, take its life, carve the spirit out of the wood for all to see, and listen to what it has to say to ears that need to hear it. The vision I have been given guides my passion, and desire to record the past and present, with
three dimensional form. I strongly believe in the traditional hand-carved wooden mask, traditional ceremony and storytelling. Each mask speaks to me, guides me, the tree that is chosen speaks to me to carve the spirit of our ancestors and the stories of our life givers and life protectors that live here in
Mi’kma’ki, to be shown to all people of the land. In the end the spirits of the trees will speak of my people of today and my ancestors of the past, through the wooden mask, storytelling, and the language of the land. My work as a Mi’kmaw artist represents tradition for the Mi'kmaw people, to guarantee the
preservation of traditional values, new and old ceremonies, oral storytelling, and the gathering of people to share in life stories together.
Liam Tromans
Nova Scotia
Liam was born in Cape Breton and has been an artist since childhood. A professional logger for over 30 years, he began self-taught carving on his worksite. Liam gave up logging in 2016 to carve full time and his respect and love of nature is reflected in his works. He has participated in numerous carving events and competitions nationally and internationally. Spirit of Wood-2008 (Maple Ridge - 1st), Atlantic Canadian Chainsaw Competition-2013 (Fredericton, NB - 1st ), Powel River BC Logger Sports - 2017 (1st ), Eibauer International Competition (Germany - 1st ), Wood to Wonder-2018 (Gold river BC - 1st), World Class Competion-2018 (Hope BC - 1st ). Liam also attends Exhibitions and Shows to demonstrate and show carvings. He has recently returned to Nova Scotia and is based in the Amherst/Tidnish area.
NSCAD Carvers
NSCAD will once again take part in the vibrant East Coast Credit Union Ice Festival and are pleased to introduce a select group of students from the Sculpture Department ranging from Introductory to Advanced levels. These emerging artists join the festival eager to learn and push their practice with the unique material: ice. This event will highlight their dedication to material explorations as well as adapting to the challenges of working outdoors. Amidst the festive atmosphere, the finished sculptures will become both a celebration of winter and a public testament to the students' commitment to their craft.
NSCAD ice carving is sponsored by TD Insurance
Zyanya Barbara
Zyanya Barbara is an award-winning film director, screenwriter, cinematographer, editor,oil painter, animator and poet. Her film work has been selected for multiple film festivalsin Canada and Mexico, and her paintings are exhibited in a variety of art galleries in North America. She has a BFA in Fine Arts with a Film major from NSCAD University
and returned for her MFA Fall 2025.
Jessica Winton
Jessica Winton is a sculptor and collaborator who advocates for art in the public realm. Her transdisciplinary practice finds a variety of outcomes – all drawn from her belief in the ability of the arts to imagine and support alternate futures. Her process develops through Film & TV industry builds and recently, RPT Faculty at NSCAD.
Elanor Jazz
Elanor Jazz is a sculptor based in Kjipuktuk/ Halifax, Nova Scotia, whose ephemeral metal sculptures reveal an unexpected softness beneath the surface of rigidity. Through her work, metal transforms from solid structure to a symbol of fluidity, reflecting the malleable nature of urban life. She spent time learning about art & design at the Bauhaus Universitat then pursued her formal fine arts studies at the Nova Scotia College of Art & Design.
Her latest piece “Sacrificial” was exhibited at the 2025 Nocturne Art by Night Festival. Her work lives in public spaces as well as in private collectors’ displays across Canada and the United States.
Bianca McDonald
Bianca McDonald (she/her/elle) is an interdisciplinary artist from Alberta whose work foregrounds the body, in its relational forms, as a site of tension, memory, and inquiry. She holds a BFA in Sculpture from Alberta University of the Arts in Mohkinstsis (Calgary), and is currently based in Kjipuktuk (Halifax). Through sculpture, installation, and performance, McDonald explores desire, grief, violence, fragility, and the shifting intersections of femininity and rurality, examining how the self is shaped by history and place. Her current body of work navigates the complexities of her own positionality, calling into question the forces that define rural experience - hyper-masculinity, extractive practices, land-based knowledge, human–animal relational violence, and the culturally embedded narratives of resilience, machismo, and grit. She approaches the rural-urban continuum with
nuance, unsettling familiar narratives while creating space for more complex,
embodied understandings of what it can mean to come from, move through, and be shaped by rural spaces.
Max Taylor
Max Taylor is a third-year Interdisciplinary Arts student at NSCAD University. With a keen interest in sculpture, he dabbles in many different mediums, using material exploration as encouragement for the viewer to confront their deepest feelings - withdrawing inner dialogues and unanswered questions. Taylor’s work has been exhibited throughout Halifax, Nova Scotia, with the most recent exhibition taking place at the ViewPoint Gallery in Bedford, on until February 2026.
Chenyu Wan
Chenyu Wan is currently a master of design student at NSCAD. Before beginning his study in NSCAD Chen worked as a graphic designer and a scientific artist. Ever since coming to NSCAD Chen has been exploring various art forms such as sculpturing, printing making, weaving, and wheel-throwing.
Kaspian Packwood
Kaspian Packwood is an interdisciplinary artist born and raised in Nova Scotia. His art focuses on the abstraction of biological and historical knowledge to uncover strange contradictions between himself and the natural world. Interested since he was young in toys and games he's built a collection of out there skills to try and make sure no imagined idea would be out of reach.
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