I often take pleasure in thinking about my late uncle, David Buller. If you knew him, or if you've read about him on this website, then you know that he was funny, and irreverent, and irreplaceable. Today is the 17th anniversary of the day David was yanked from our lives, and I'm thinking about what that means this many years later. On Jan 18th, 2001, David was the victim of a terrible crime. A brazen crime. He was murdered in his office at 1 Spadina Cr. at the University of Toronto, and the person who did that to him has still not been found.
As an artist, a teacher, a gay man, and all-around decent human being, David had a profound influence on me. He rarely gave advice, but he had the guts to follow his passions in life, and that example was plenty to work with.
The loss of David left a hole in our hearts, and in our family. This week my mom said to me, “It still feels unreal, like a dream. I can’t believe this is happening to us.” When you lose someone, suddenly and traumatically, the experience never moves into the past tense.
Inspired by this poster from the art collective Fierce Pussy, For the Record - Visual AIDS (2014), I could write a hundred “If you were alive today’s…” for David, maybe more.
![]() | | If You Were Alive Today (unfinished) If you were alive today we would not have to live with the unanswered question. If you were alive today you would know that I live in Chicago now. If you were alive today you’d be cracking your great niece and nephews up with your sarcasm at family get togethers. If you were alive today we would have known each other as adults (I was 32 when you were murdered, with so much growing up to do, as it turns out). If you were alive today I would have so many things to ask you about art and teaching. If you were alive today you would hate being 67 (but of course you would still be handsome and fit). If you were alive today maybe I would tell you all the ways in which you influenced me (I hope you could see it). If you were alive today I would not be fighting tears on the El train while I write these words into my phone. If you were alive today I would not be getting emails from psychics and amateur investigators who think they can solve the case. If you were alive today we would be planning your retirement party from the Visual Art Department at the University of Toronto. If you were alive today I probably wouldn’t appreciate how lucky I was to know you. If you were alive today we would not be finding ways, because you were you, to keep a little hope. |

David Bowie died last week. Of course my uncle, David Buller (1950-2001), was a Bowie fan. For an artistic, gay kid growing up in the suburbs of Toronto in the 1950s and 60s, David Bowie must have been a beacon of the possibilities for a life that lay just ahead: art school at (what was then) the Ontario College of Art (OCA), coming out, traveling across Canada on an Art in the Parks grant, and living for a short but formative time in Paris. Later still, there would be an apartment in Montreal, an MFA in the painting program at Concordia, and teaching in the Fine Arts Department at the University of Toronto.
January 18th, 2016 marks the 15th anniversary of the still unsolved murder of David Buller in his office at 1 Spadina Cr., University of Toronto. The last few years have been busy ones for David’s family and friends. In 2014, there was renewed interest in this story from a TV program, “To Catch a Killer,” where a team of civilians—specialists in different fields—takes a fresh look at unsolved murders.
While the episode didn’t give us any magical answers, it did help us to remain in active conversation with the Toronto Homicide Cold Case Unit, a relatively new department under the leadership of Detective Sergeant Brian Borg. And the episode has also helped to keep an important, albeit difficult, conversation about what may have happened to David alive in Toronto’s queer, arts and academic circles.
A few weeks ago, I found these undated photographs of David tucked inside an envelope in the back of an old family photo album. My mom (David’s sister, Betty-Lou) thinks they were probably taken when David was 15 or 16 years old, around 1965-66. David didn’t actually play the guitar, and as a teenager he probably wouldn’t have been permitted to smoke in my grandparents’ house. But he knew how to strike a pose.

Among the many thoughts that flood inward on the fifteenth anniversary of my uncle's murder, there is this: he would have turned 65 this year. David Buller the senior citizen, distinguished grey, and elder statesman. I wonder how would he have felt about that?
Of course he would not have liked the first hints of muscle sag, the acceleration of the greying process, the extra aches, the wrinkles, the doctor telling him for the umpteenth time to give up alcohol (or become a vegetarian, according to one story he told). I think he would have studiously avoided any attraction or institution (even major art galleries) that offered a senior's discount. He would have rather moved to Kandahar than settle any where designated as a "retirement community." I don't really see him lawn bowing, golfing, or playing bridge, either. Suduko or crosswords were never really his thing.
So what would Dave be doing as he embarked on this new life stage? Certainly, I think, he would still be working. His passion for teaching undiminished, he would have found it difficult to walk away from the classroom at the standard retirement age. I have no doubt he would still be making art, fifteen years further along the evolution that had driven him to include multimedia content in his work.
I have to think that he would be content, no hint of old fartism anywhere despite the occasional gripe about aging. A sense of humour intact, a few more debts paid, excellent health and some opportunities for travel under his belt -- things would be looking up for David as the calendar rolled around to 2016. Most importantly, he could look back on a rich career as an academic and artist with quiet satisfaction.
So often I place David in the present moment, imagining what he might say or do in a particular situation. During the Toronto Blue Jays playoff run this past fall, I could practically imagine him pacing in my living room, then walking out of the room (as he did in 1992) to pour another drink because he couldn't take the suspense any more ("it's just too much," he said). Maybe he would take my own kids to a baseball game as he did with me decades ago now.
Of course, the problem with imagining those we have
lost into our present is that they are never really there.
Like Orpheus we try
to lead them back to our world, only to find they have slipped away. Which I
suppose is a really complicated way of saying that I miss Uncle Dave.
January 18th, 2016
Lives Lived column, The Globe and Mail
Wednesday, Oct 10, 2001
David went to the Ontario College of Art from 1969 to 1973, but his career did not really take shape until a group show at the Pollock Gallery in 1979 and solo shows in 1980 and 1981. The paintings from this period are difficult and uncompromising; large, dramatic abstracts overlap regular patterns of lines or shapes with bursting swirls of colour.
For him, teaching was inspiration, not obligation. His students gave him exceptional reviews, and it soon became difficult to get into his courses. He was instrumental in developing an innovative interdisciplinary Masters Program in Visual Studies (scheduled to open at the U of T in the Fall of 2002).
Toronto's Gay Pride Parade was, for Dave, Christmas in June. The last painting he completed includes the words "history counsels patience,' a quote from the poet W.H. Auden who denounced the Nazi persecution of homosexuals.
My uncle was found stabbed to death in his office last January. His death has profoundly shaken his family and close friends. He is much loved and sorely missed.