by Della Fougère • Cape Breton • 2026-04-20
Under Wide Stars: Carissa Ainslie Is Building Queer Community in Rural Nova Scotia
When asked who she is, Carissa pauses for a moment before answering. “That’s a really good question,” she says, laughing softly. “I’m still figuring that out.”
It’s an honest answer -- one that reflects a life built around curiosity, creativity, and community. Using she/her pronouns, Carissa describes herself as someone deeply passionate about the arts, but even more passionate about the people those arts bring together.
“I care a lot about the arts and community,” she says, “especially queer community in rural spaces.”
A self-described nerd, she finds joy in comic books, fantasy novels, and movies that lean unapologetically geeky. She studied art and spent years immersed in creative practice, though these days her creativity often shows up in a different way: in how she builds spaces, organizations, and opportunities for other artists.
Carissa grew up in Halifax before moving to Toronto in 2010 to attend art school. After graduating, she stayed in the city for more than a decade, working a mix of creative and corporate jobs while building a life surrounded by art and culture.
I had this vision of a place where artists could come together
Then the pandemic hit. Like so many people, the global pause forced her to reconsider what she wanted her future to look like; at the time she was working in a corporate job that felt far removed from the creative life she had imagined for herself.
But even before Covid arrived, something had already begun to shift: Carissa had enrolled in a postgraduate certificate program in social entrepreneurship and social innovation at OCAD University in Toronto. During her first class, an idea she had been quietly carrying began to take shape.
“I had this vision of a place where artists could come together,” she explains. “Somewhere they could meet, collaborate, and create.”
That idea slowly grew into a plan for an artist retreat space—a place that could offer creative time, connection, and inspiration away from the pressures of city life and eventually that plan brought her back to Nova Scotia.
Searching across the province, Carissa found a property in Pictou County that felt like possibility waiting to happen: more than twenty-five acres of land, a beautiful old house, and several unique buildings scattered across the landscape. She calls it, The Meadows / Retreat and Creative Space.
She says the space felt full of potential: quiet, nature, and a sky full of stars.
Building Queer Community Through Art in Rural Nova Scotia
When Carissa talks about the future, she does so with honesty: “There’s a lot that’s unknown right now.”
But if uncertainty defines the moment, so does something else: community. The land was only part of what convinced her to stay. “I really lucked out moving to Pictou County,” she says. “There are so many interesting people here, and there’s a lot of innovative energy.”
That energy is especially important when building queer community in rural places—something Carissa knows takes patience.
Holding the Mantle in Pictou County
When the previous organizers of Pride in Pictou County stepped away at the end of 2022, a small group -- including Carissa -- chose to keep it alive.
“We picked up the mantle in January 2023,” she says. Since then, she’s moved from co-chair to board chair, helping rebuild Pride as something both consistent and evolving.
Today, Pictou County Pride hosts a week-long annual Pride festival alongside year-round programming: hiking groups, creative drop-ins, cookie-making nights, dances, and community gatherings. The goal is simple but vital—creating spaces where people can find each other. With youth events, 19+ programming, and all-ages offerings, they’re intentionally reaching across generations.
“There’s a pretty large queer community here, but it’s scattered,” Carissa says. Much of the work is about connection, especially for newcomers looking to find their place. Like many grassroots organizations, it’s volunteer-run and always in progress. “We’re always looking for people power and support,” she adds.
Still, there’s something steady in what’s being built. In Pictou County, support often shows up. Municipal partners back events, Pride flag raisings are welcomed, and local, provincial, and federal representatives regularly attend.
a community choosing, again and again, to show up and to carry the mantle forward together.
“I know that’s not the case everywhere,” Carissa says. “But we’ve been pretty lucky here.”
That luck is reflected in the community itself: families who come out, people who stay, and a growing sense of belonging that extends beyond Pride week.
What’s happening in Pictou County may be quiet, but it’s powerful: a community choosing, again and again, to show up and to carry the mantle forward together.
Despite the louder voices that sometimes dominate online conversations, Carissa says the broader community in Pictou County has largely been supportive of queer initiatives. Local municipal leaders regularly attend and engage in the community. There’s also a quieter part of Carissa’s story, one that many people will recognize. “I’m trying to take time and really appreciate where I live now.” she says, “Living so close to the water and the beaches in the summer is really special.”
The landscape around her has become part of how she resets. The ocean, the open land, and the slower pace of life offer moments of calm between the challenges of building something new.
She says, “I’m almost 40, and I don’t have an answer how to deal with stress. Someone asked me recently if I had any tips, and honestly, I’m still working on it. If you figure it out before I do, let me know.”
But she’s honest about the fact that balance isn’t always easy.
Riding the Wave: Queer Art, Cuts, and Community
“If you had asked me a few months ago, I would have said I knew where things were heading. Now, I’m not so sure.”
"Across the province, we’re seeing cuts to the arts that don’t just impact programming, but the ecosystems that sustain queer creativity. In Halifax, Pride is losing funding. Organizations that rely on a mix of sponsorships, donations, and municipal partnerships are bracing, recalibrating; some will weather it better than others, but no one is untouched."
In Carissa’s own work with Creative Pictou County, the uncertainty feels immediate. “Projects we thought were secure, grants we counted on, have been reduced, halved, or cut entirely. Even operational funding, the kind that keeps the lights on, feels unstable right now. It’s the kind of precarity that seeps into everything. Planning becomes guessing. Stability becomes a question mark.”
And still—there’s something else happening, too. "The response from the community has been overwhelming in a way that catches in your throat. People are writing letters to their MLAs. They’re posting, sharing, insisting on the value of the arts, not as a luxury, but as a necessity. She says, “I went to a drag brunch at Stardust recently, and El Noir spoke about the rallies happening in Halifax and across the province. Listening to that, I felt it—emotion rising, unexpectedly.” Not just frustration, but something closer to tenderness. Because people are showing up.
Not just artists, but those who deeply understand the role art plays in our communities. The way it holds us, reflects us, gives us language when we don’t have it. When things start to feel dire, the arts are often the first thing pushed aside, and yet, they’re also the thing that reminds us who we are.
events are bringing people together, creating space for connection, reminding us that there is power in numbers.
Carissa has been seeing more of these moments lately, events that are bringing people together, creating space for connection, reminding us that there is power in numbers. That power feels important right now, it feels necessary.
What that will mean for Pride, for artists, for the future of queer arts in this province, she doesn’t know yet, “Time will tell. But I do know that these conversations matter, and I hope they don’t stop when the urgency fades from headlines. The future, for me, feels uncertain. There’s a lot I can’t map out. But I’m trying to take stock of what matters: where my energy goes, what I want to hold onto. I think we’re all a bit tired, trying to figure out how to move forward, how to keep doing the work, how to keep caring.”
That openness about uncertainty, about growth, about still learning—is part of what makes Carissa’s work feel so grounded. She isn’t pretending to have all the answers. Instead, she’s creating space for people to explore, connect, and create together. And maybe that’s the real heart of her vision. Not perfection. But possibility. And sometimes, that’s exactly where the most meaningful stories begin.
Pictou County Pride, and all the Prides in Atlantic Canada, is listed here in the Wayves Atlantic Canada Pride Calendar.
