The tradition of landscape painting in Canada is one of Pure Landscape – depicting the land as it truly is, largely free from symbolic content. John's work pursues a conceptual departure from this tradition, introducing the viewer to a new way of observing the land. The heavy simplification of symbolic forms and a tangible awareness for the physicality of painting create a platform from which to retell the Canadian landscape story. His goal is to create paintings that, in the footsteps of the European Symbolists, emphasize an interpretable meaning behind line, shape and subject. The result is a collection of narratives about a place populated with the remnants of human influence and reclaimed by a wilder element.

"My stories always begin as an impulsive set of images that collect within the borders of a scene. Though guided by a structured conceptual theme, these scenes don’t profess any specific or absolute meaning. They are an invitation to seek out an untold story.