The first Edward Burtynsky photograph that I remember seeing was a dark, flat landscape cut through the middle by a river flowing bright red. At the time, I thought manufactured landscapes referred to the artist’s manufacturing of the photograph— I thought Burtynsky had altered the picture, added red to the river. I was wrong: the river actually flows red due to the tailings that are dumped in it from a nickel mine outside of Sudbury.
Burtynsky takes pictures of landscapes that have been manufactured. He captures the imprint that people, our industries and our wastes, make on the natural world. As his website explains, “He photographs civilization’s materials and debris, but in a way people describe as ‘stunning’ or ‘beautiful,’ and so raises all kinds of questions about ethics and aesthetics without trying to easily answer them.”
Everyone can look at his photos and take a different meaning from them. He doesn’t condemn, he merely exposes— and he makes it look beautiful in the process.
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