Burtynsky

[tim atherton]

Went to see a Burtynsky show this past weekend (Not the more recent China work - but a retrospective group covering from his early work to the Three Gorges work).

I must say I was underwhelmed. I'm still not quite sure what it was about the work that didn't click for me. The prints were gorgeous. Some individual photographs were quite intriguing. But overall they left me cold.

By contrast, when I went saw a bunch of Gursky and Struth photographs at the Tate Modern a few years ago my experience was they were far better than I expected and I came away from them excited and wanting more

[Paul Kierstead]

I really enjoyed Burtynsky a great deal, except the ship-breaking, which I didn't care for. I think "cold" might actually cover it nicely for quite a bit of it; it was part of the feel that appealed to me. Struth doesn't do it for me, at least what I seen at the Tate. I left Burtynsky quite inspired.

As an aside, I went to see Chris Pratt's exhibition last week, and it was very inspirational, with wonderful light and composition. (He is a Canadian Painter for those who don't know him).

[tim atherton]

As I walked around I had the feeling that apart from the obvious - "the environment" - I wasn't really sure what else the work was about. And that seemed a fairly blunt and repetitive stick (schtick?).

In the end I left thinking that in part they really weren't that much different from a bunch of National Geographic photos, just taken with a 4x5 (or 8x10 for the earlier work) and printed a bit larger - In this Months Editions: Ship Breaking in India; The wonderful world of Marble Quarries; Big Oil in Texas etc.

(as someone else there said - but maybe that's why they are so popular).

In the end a felt they lacked real depth as a whole body of work.

It was a bit of a disappointment though - I liked his book a certain amount - although it never quite grabbed me. An I thought that when I saw a whole show of the prints they would make more sense

[Paul Kierstead]

Heh, I am facsinated by modernist collections of geometric shapes; I found the quarry stuff and refinery to be extremely interesting. The recycling, so-so. I am not sure it is about something; some photography is more abstract ... maybe just about texture, or light and form, or the absolute gleam and pristine nature of a industrial plant which is essentially making toxins (in the meta-sense); hmmm ... maybe those were about something. Or the beautiful geometry and neatness (as in tidy) of a mine, which is quite unexpected.

OTOH, I find his "biggest and best" shtick to be a bit gimmicky, but I guess it does help market it.

[Walter Foscari]

Never been a big fun of Burtysnky myself, I agree that he hasn't added much to this trend. Recently saw his China exhibit in a Toronto gallery, and some of the images were impressive indeed but beyond the initial wow, somehow none of them really stuck to my mind as really good images do.

He's undoubtedly an excellent businessman, his Toronto Image Works has grown into a huge enterprise in only a few years, and his business skills are reflected also in his ability to market himself as a photographer. His prints go for several grands, yet they appear to sell extremely well.

A recent NYTimes article just hit the nail on the head I think:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/28/arts/design/28john.html?ex=1137128400&en=3d07cb505b430915&ei=5070

Walter

[Bruce Watson]

People have made similar complaints about Ansel Adams in the past - that they felt his photographs were too somber. Cold and analytical, that sort of thing. Me, I like his work a lot. I also like some of Burtynsky's work. He is perhaps popular because of his technical expertise, perhaps because of his "beauty-in-destruction" thing, perhaps other reasons. I don't know.

It is difficult to explain to someone why we like the things we like (thus the rise of art critics ;-). The short answer is, we just do. It has been like this throughout human history, and this is largely responsible for the wide range of things from which to choose, from foods to art. The human mind is a strange and wonderful thing.

[tim atherton]

thanks for that NY Time article - I was starting to think it was just me...

Says it a bit more forcefully than I might, but I think it hits the nail on the head from my perspective.

Maybe there will be a chance for questions when he gives a talk here in a couple of weeks :-)

[Mike Boden]

I've never heard of Burtynsky before so I did a Google search. I came across the following website that hosts quite a number of his images. www.cowlesgallery.com/Burtynsky.html

Anyway, after studying his work a little, I came across the feeling that he's simply a landscape photographer. But instead of capturing the beauty of the land as most do, he's capturing the destruction and industrialization of the land by the human race. Futhermore, as it's been stated already, the images certainly have a cold feeling. In addition, they aren't necessarily interesting or challenging compositions, but that works to his advantage. I feel that if he strictly adhered to the typical compositional rule of thirds or balance or symmetry or tonalities and so on, as well as adjusting the exposure to fit within the film's latidue, then the composition itself would be competing with the subject matter. Thus, he's simply trying to document the subject, and for this, I think he's hit the nail squarely on the head. I also think these images were created to provoke the viewer to think and question what we're doing to the world.

On another note, I found myself exceptionally interested in his shipbreaking photos of Chittagong, Bangladesh, because of another contempory photographer who recently had permission to photograph the shipbreaking yards. His name his Michael Reichmann, and the contrast of his photos against Burtynsky's is striking. You can check out a few of his photos at www.luminous-landscape.com/locations/ship-breaking.shtml. Anyway, I feel that Michael's images all have a beautification to the subject matter whereas Burtynsky's does not, and I also think that Michael's images of this series are more about the people within the landscape versus the landscape itself. At any rate, the contrast is undeniable and interesting to compare.

[Paul Kierstead]

Interesting comparison, Mike. I have met Micheal (on a workshop I attended) and have followed his website (and hence work) for several years, close to when it began. IMO, he is a better street photographer or photojournalist (his early work as a photojournalist is quite excellent) then he is landscape photographer, even if he concentrates on the latter nowadays. I would agree with your assessment as to the ship-breaking photo's, but I think it reflects the respective photographers strengths.

I find the term "simply a landscape photographer" to be curious, as it has a pejorative tone. Is this a negative in your opinion? In anycase, I think his photo's are more abstract and interesting then "simple landscape", though OTOH I would tend to suggest that great landscape photo's transcend documentation of a beautiful scene. OTOH, I tend to not read too much, so I never really got his message about man's impact, etc; For me, every action causes some effect and it is not so simple to divide it all up into good/bad from an ethical or moral point of view. Now for man's survival, it is pretty easy to tell what is bad, but I don't consider that to be necessarily a moral question, just one of survival. Whether man *deserves* to survive is a moral question left unanswered by Burtynsky.

[Mike Boden]

Hi Paul,

I most certainly did not intend to associate a negative or pejorative tone to landscape photography. In fact, I entertain the thought that I'm a landscape photographer myself. That's where my passion lies and what I'm drawn to.

At any rate, what I inteded was that in simple, plain, pure, and unembellished terms, if you break down the essence of his imagery, he's a landscape photographer. Another way to look at it is if you take away the pretension of his name, his reputation, his allure(or aversion), and of his image's connotative, symbolic, and monetary value, we're looking at a landscape photograph. At least by my definition, which is rather broad. He chooses to capture the industrialized and manufactured landscape whereas Reichmann and so many others try to capture the landscape of beauty, surrealism, ethereality, or otherwise. Each has it's own place. Hence, the reason why it's art.