I was born and raised in the wooded hills of Pittsburgh, PA along with 10 siblings. A product of my British mother Beryl, and my Irish American father Lawrence. They met in England during WW2. I now live in Chicago, where I make my work, and teach at The School of The Art Institute of Chicago, and am father to Carmen and Silvia Abelson.
I have been creating experimental film and theater for 30 years. I have shown my work in festivals, theaters, and museums worldwide, including at the Zagreb World Festival of Animation, Humboldt Film Festival, Ann Arbor Film Festival, Ottawa Animation Festival, Guggenheim Museum, Boston Museum, Tribeca Film Festival, Osian's Cinefest in India, Haifa Film Festival, Chicago International, Milano, Vancouver International, Pacific Film Archives Denver Starz, Annecy, Fantoche, and many more. Consuming Spirits had it’s theatrical debut at New York’s Film Forum for a two-week run in December of 2012. It then moved to Cinefamily In LA, and the Gene Siskel Film Center Chicago.
Consuming Spirits began production in earnest in 1999 after receiving funding in the form of a fellowship from The John Simon Guggenheim Foundation and then equal funding came in the next year from a Rockefeller Foundation Film Fellowship. Just as Consuming Spirits was finally finished, I received a Creative Capital Grant to start work on another experimental feature, The Orbit of Minor Satellites.
