Max Collins is a wheat-paste artist who recently moved back to his hometown of Buffalo from Portland, Oregon, where he worked as a licensed funeral director and taught interactive artmaking workshops for bereaved individuals and families. His Hallow Studios offers Western New York families and communities artistic avenues to memorialize people in meaningful ways, including photo art commissions, public memorial murals, workshops, and personalized art exhibitions. He has commented, “Inspired by personal experiences of the role artmaking can play in the experience of grief and loss, I’ve been focused on exploring how this more physical approach to photographic images can be utilized in the experience of memorializing loved ones who have passed away.” Collins has a BFA from the University of Michigan and an MFA from the University at Buffalo.