As part of the podcast series, “ArtsAbly in Conversation,” Diane Kolin interviewed seeley quest, a trans disabled environmentalist, arts and equity educator, living in Toronto in Canada.
This post presents the resources that seeley quest mentioned during the conversation. The episode will be available soon.
seeley quest
seeley quest (sie/hir), a trans disabled environmentalist, arts and equity educator in Canada since 2017, previously in the San Francisco Bay Area 1998-2015, became active in Sins Invalid’s collective 2007-2015, and co-edited the Ten Principles of Disability Justice. Sie inaugurated a 2021 Quebec Writers’ Federation disabled writers’ workshop, “Solarpunk: Writing Futures with Resiliency” for Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia, and in December 2025 led a multi-week protopian scenarios development workshop using foresight practices, at Toronto’s Centre for Social Innovation.
Learn more about the “Modeling” project
Through Our Fingers ritual
Artists’ collective Tuya Vale hosted a Toronto works in progress show in a series called “Silt” in April 2025, at 918 Bathurst. At the start of this piece, they helped bring small cups to all 60 attendees, with a few tablespoons of sand in the bottom, so all in audience had opportunity for direct contact with the element, and to bring a portion home with them.
An excerpt of this video appears at the beginning of the podcast episode.
Watch the full video of Through Our Fingers ritual
“Crip, Arts: Community Trajectories and Agendas”
The author reflects on hir coming to identify as physically and cognitively disabled, making performance work concerning these identities and communities, the influence of Sins Invalid’s projects, challenges of securing arts funding while immigrating to Canada, and the activisms of developing disability-centred arts in smaller cities, of bridging ‘professional’ and ‘community arts,’ of increased training for disabled theatremakers onstage and offstage, and of amplifying improvements in working conditions industry-wide. Sie also discusses challenging paradigms of disabled relationships to desire and consent, of simplified narratives and conventional modes of staging our theatre, and hir goals for prioritizing work co-developed in local communities that experiments and explores.
Published in the Canadian theatre review, 2022-04, Vol.190 (1), p.60-63
Sins Invalid
Sins Invalid is a disability justice-based movement building and performance project that celebrates disabled people, centering and led by disabled Black, Indigenous, and people of the global majority, and queer, trans, and nonbinary disabled people. Sins Invalid’s work explores themes of disabled embodiment and the world around us, developing provocative work where paradigms of “normal” and “disabled” are challenged, offering instead a vision of beauty and justice inclusive of all bodies and communities.
Read the 10 Principles of Disability Justice
Patty Berne
Patty Berne was an American writer, performance artist, film director, and disability rights organizer. She was a pioneering leader in the disability justice movement, and was the co-founder of Sins Invalid, a disability justice-based performance project that incubates performers with disabilities, centering people of color and LGBTQ/gender-variant people.
Lire le In Memoriam page about Patty Berne on Sins Invalid’s website
Leroy Moore
Leroy Moore is an African American writer, poet, and community activist. He was born November 2, 1967, in New York City. He is one of the founders of Krip Hop. Moore and his counterparts Rob DA’ Noise Temple and Keith Jones started Krip Hop, a movement that uses hip-hop music as a means of expression for people with disabilities. He is a co-founder of the disability performance art collective Sins Invalid.