If there were some bright spots around the world during the past year, one of them has to be “psychedelic folk artist” Lewis Mallard, who quite literally walks around Hamilton, Ontario in a mallard duck costume. Mallard began experimenting with the homemade duck costume during the city’s Supercrawl festival in 2019, he told me over the phone from his downtown studio.

He has since become somewhat of a local celebrity, turning up randomly downtown, stopping some people in their tracks while others scramble to get their phones out for a quick snap. His true identity is unknown to most, as the costume conceals his face.

“I am Lewis,” he offered when I asked him if it’s his real name. But he corrected my pronunciation of Mallard. “I prefer Mallard… like canard.” (French for duck.) “I like to work under a certain amount of anonymity. It lets me work outside of my normal style.”

More Than Your Average Folk Artist

On that note, the duck persona is the first time he’s tried performance art. He is a traditionally trained visual artist who studied at Ontario’s Sheridan College, well-known for its illustration and animation programs. Talented with his hands, he crafts the costumes himself out of papier-mâché and chicken wire with a “duck call” to add quack factor. Mallard’s vision and hearing are limited in the costume, so it takes a bit of skill to get around in (not to mention being uncomfortable in the heat).

He didn’t know what to expect the first time out as a duck. “People looked at me in a way that nobody had ever looked at me before,” he said of that first foray into the streets. “It’s such a weird experience to be looked at in a new way. It was refreshing and therapeutic in a way. I started to enjoy going out more than I thought I would.”

He’s had a range of reactions on the streets, but it’s been overwhelmingly positive, he said. “There are some people who want to give me a hug and get photos, and a few hooligans who have accosted me,” he recounts. But he doesn’t seem to hold any hard feelings about the negative encounter. “I would offer those hooligans a summer internship in my studio since they’re obviously passionate.”

The Hamilton folk artist explains some people are not interested in interacting at all, and he senses that vibe and stays away. Some dogs have been freaked out by his costume, and some men have gone into “alpha mode” before realizing he’s not a threat to their family or partner, he said with a chuckle.

Making Art During the Pandemic Fits the Bill

During the early stages of the pandemic, Mallard was making homemade cloth masks (he is also talented in sewing) that he delivered in full costume for an enhanced customer experience. That was a successful way to keep him “out of the red” as he had lost a part-time job early on, he explained. While he’s no longer making the masks, he’s still having fun with the costume in different ways.

For example, he recently had a show called Take It or Thieve It, which involved placing four duck-themed paintings on recovered plywood around the city centre and then posting a map on his Instagram as sort of a scavenger hunt.

Those pieces went faster than he expected. While he gave them away for free, he said he plans to sell screen prints of those works sometime soon. Speaking of selling, he doesn’t have a website yet, but he noted Instagram has been an effective way to move pieces. “I’ve mailed art to people in the States through Instagram, not sure how they found me.”

He says the pandemic has been a plus for him in some ways, noting it has “forced” him to focus more on his artistic pursuits. “People are more into [the duck costume] during the pandemic,” he added. “They’re open to something more silly because everything was so serious.”

Boosting the Arts Scene in Hamilton

Mallard has worked with some local creators as his duck persona since introducing it to the city, including a Mohawk College film crew for a video shoot at Hamilton’s Bayfront Park. On his way to that shoot, he recalls that he misjudged some stairs because of limited vision in the costume. “I slid down the railing like some kind of skateboard trick and landed on my feet,” he said with a laugh. His costume sustained some damage in the process.

Other than the film shoot, the Hamilton folk artist has helped other creators with their projects. They include appearing in the book My Year with a Giant Tiger by local writer/photographer Sara Heinonen. Heinonen was among the first to spot Lewis Mallard and photograph him in 2019. She eagerly arranged a drop-off of some masks from him at Giant Tiger after that encounter, noting he delivered them “like an egg onto the pavement.”

She now calls herself his official photographer. “There’s no beak-written agreement but rather an inter-species understanding. So we aren’t really collaborating but rather informally helping each other out with our respective projects,” Heinonen wrote in an email.

Lewis Mallard May Travel the World

Mallard has family roots in Hamilton, and he hopes to help the city become more of an artist destination. His fiancée is an opera singer, and while that means inevitably leaving the country to perform when possible, he also sees that as an opportunity to take Lewis Mallard on the road. (But if he does leave, it will only be temporarily, he assures.)

The costume is not going away anytime soon, but it could take different forms. “It’s all about giving people unique experiences, giving them an experience they didn’t know they wanted,” he said. “It’s something to talk about, something to laugh about. I want more.”