Powerful images show the environmental impact of recent industrialization in Africa

By Kristine Thoreson
Galleries West

In the light-filled back room of the Paul Kuhn Gallery, I’m both transfixed and perplexed by the colours in a photograph by Edward Burtynsky. Salt Flats #2, Sua Pan, Botswana holds luscious swirls of cherry-blossom pinks and amethyst purples. It’s so mesmerizing, I barely wonder what it is.

The image, part of the Toronto photographer’s latest body of work, African Studies, is on view in Calgary until May 27. Burtynsky’s large colour prints show aerial views from across Sub-Saharan Africa shot between 2015 and 2020 using fixed-wing planes, helicopters and drones. He visited 10 countries in all – Kenya, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Ghana, Senegal, South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, Madagascar and Tanzania.

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Profile: Edward Burtynsky

NYC-ARTS

A profile of Canadian photographer Edward Burtynsky, known for his large format photographs of industrial landscapes. His work integrates critical reporting with visual aesthetics, bearing witness to the impact of humans on the planet.

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Of Salt, Sulfur, and Ore

By Elyssa Goodman
Blind Magazine

At first glance, Edward Burtynsky’s “African Studies” exhibition at the Howard Greenberg Gallery is a majestic geometry of colors and shapes, all with roots in art history.

The salt ponds of Senegal have traces of Gustav Klimt, sewn together mosaic-like near the towns of Tikat Banguel and Fatick. A view from above the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam recalls M.C. Escher’s famed staircases. In the coal tailings of South Africa, the plume of an Erte ensemble and the distressed rivulets of a Jackson Pollock. But a closer look, a closer read, reveals the startling nature of what Burtynsky calls “business as usual.”

“African Studies” is currently on view in two New York galleries: at Howard Greenberg until April 22 and at the Sundaram Tagore Gallery until April 1. It was also released as a monograph by Steidl at the end of last year. It is a continuation of Burtynsky’s travels across the globe, capturing modern landscapes both touched and untouched by human hands, some more virulently than others.

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Altered Topography

By Saffron Ward
Aesthetica Magazine

In November 2022, the world’s population hit 8 billion – a staggering milestone. Although the growth rate is slowing, the resources needed to support human life remain out of reach. Approximately 1.75 Earths are needed to sustain current activity. Therefore, the natural world has been morphing into something altogether different for centuries. In 2019, the United Nation’s global assessment report stated that 75% of ice-free land has been significantly changed by society, from agriculture to housing and industry. This “terrible beauty” is the subject of Edward Burtynsky’s (b. 1955) large-scale photographic works.

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In ‘African Studies,’ Edward Burtynsky Photographs the Human Imprint on Sub-Saharan Landscapes

By Grace Ebert
Colossal

Renowned photographer Edward Burtynsky approaches his latest project with curiosity about the future of human impact and globalization. From the diamond mines of South Africa to the richly textured landscape of Namibia’s Tsaus Mountains, African Studies spotlights the sub-Saharan region and its reserves of metals, salt, precious gemstones, and other ores. “I am surveying two very distinct aspects of the landscape,” he says in a statement, “that of the earth as something intact, undisturbed yet implicitly vulnerable… and that of the earth as opened up by the systematic extraction of resources.”

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Pictures from above: What a bird's eye view of Africa reveals

By Mary Harper
BBC News Africa

For the past 40 years, Edward Burtynsky has photographed the impact of human industry on the planet and for his latest collection, African Studies, he travelled across the continent taking photos from above. He spoke to the BBC's Mary Harper.

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Photographs that don’t so much confront scale as embrace it

By Mark Feeney
Boston Globe

NEW BRITAIN, Conn. — By the numbers, “Edward Burtynsky: Earth Observed” is a small show, with just 31 photographs. There’s also a nine-minute video showing Burtynsky at work. That’s it. Yet in ways that matter more than the merely numerical — sweep, scale, ambition, urgency — it has the heft, and impact, of a much larger show.

“Edward Burtynsky: Earth Observed,” which runs through April 16 at the New Britain Museum of American Art, might be seen as a stripped-down Burtynsky career retrospective. It proceeds in roughly chronological order, with the earliest photograph from 1985, and the most recent from 2016. Five continents are represented, with only Antarctica and South America missing.

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‘We’re putting all living things at high risk’: Edward Burtynsky on the launch of the Canadian Journalism Foundation’s award for climate photojournalism

By Wendy Stueck
The Globe and Mail

For decades, Edward Burtynsky has created images that show how humans affect the natural world – turning the gritty, unglamourous details of mines, dams, shipyards and factories into haunting works that call on all of us to think about our impact on the planet.

A winner of multiple prestigious awards, the photographer has collaborated with other artists to document the impact of climate change through works including In the Wake of Progress. A multi-media project, that piece premiered at the Luminato Festival in June on advertising screens at Toronto’s Yonge-Dundas Square. Mr. Burtynsky is also one of three artists behind The Anthropocene Project, a multi-media work that investigates the impacts of humans on earth.

In December, the Canadian Journalism Foundation launched the Edward Burtynsky Award for Climate Photojournalism. The competition is open to Canadian professionals employed by, or freelancing for, domestic news outlets. The deadline for submissions is Jan. 20, 2023, with a $5,000 prize for the winner.

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