In 1979, Judith Sandiford and Ronald Weihs met in British Columbia when Ron was touring Highball!, a play about logging, to logging communities along the coast. Judith painted a 40-foot backdrop and came along to wrangle the actors.

In 1982, they moved back east to Toronto, where Ron’s play The Wobbly (about the Industrial Workers of the World) was being produced at Toronto Workshop Productions, directed by George Luscombe. Judith pursued an art career, co-founded a collective art gallery called WorkScene, and edited a quarterly art magazine. Ronald continued to write and direct plays.

In 1994, they created the first version of Artword Theatre, in a second floor studio in an old factory building on Portland Street in downtown Toronto. It was there that they began their unique blend of original theatre, music and dance concerts, spoken word and storytelling events.

In 1999, with the help of supportive landlords, and some visionary policies of the City of Toronto, they created a major art space: a 150-seat mainspace theatre, a 60-seat studio theatre and a beautiful art gallery with high white walls. There they developed their own original works of theatre, provided a home to many of the best independent theatre and dance companies in Toronto, and presented many art shows.

In 2006, the sale of the building to a condo developer forced the pair to wind down abruptly.

In 2007, Ron and Judith moved to Hamilton. In 2007-2008 they prepared and presented If Cows Could Fly by Allan Merovitz at the Irving Greenberg Theatre Centre in Ottawa.

In 2008-2009 they became the resident theatre company at The Pearl Company. There they developed the 2nd floor performance space and created a season of four shows, based on Hamilton themes. You Are What You Do, Rascals & Numskulls, Sunamabeach, and Tobacco Troubadour.

In July 2009, they bought a cafe-bar at 15 Colbourne Street near James Street North, called it Artword Artbar, and began a listening room for live music and spoken word performance.