SOCAR Oil Fields #6, Baku, Azerbaijan, 2006. © Edward Burtynsky/Courtesy of Hasted Hunt Kraeutler, New York/Nicholas Metivier Gallery, Toronto
Edward Burtynsky: Oil consists of a series of large format color images made over the last 12 years. Burtynsky’s obsession with oil began in 1997, when he identified oil as a key building block of the last century—politically, economically and socially—on a global scale. He has tracked this controversial, valuable and increasingly scarce resource from extraction to production to consumption. The far reaching scope of the project has taken him from oil fields to expressways, from Western Canada to Los Angeles to the Middle East. The exhibit runs contemporaneously at three venues, Edward Burtynsky: Oil is on view until November 28th at Hasted Hunt Kraeutler, New York; until October 31 at Nicholas Metivier Gallery, Toronto; and until December 13 at The Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington DC. Burtynsky also recently published this work in a new book, OIL, from Steidl.
SOCAR Oil Fields #3, Baku, Azerbaijan 2006. © Edward Burtynsky/Courtesy of Hasted Hunt Kraeutler, New York/Nicholas Metivier Gallery, Toronto
SOCAR Oil Fields #1a & #1b, Baku, Azerbaijan 2006. © Edward Burtynsky/Courtesy of Hasted Hunt Kraeutler, New York/Nicholas Metivier Gallery, Toronto
Oil Refineries #23, Oakville, Ontario 1999. © Edward Burtynsky/Courtesy of Hasted Hunt Kraeutler, New York/Nicholas Metivier Gallery, Toronto
Silver Lake Operations #12, Lake Lefroy, Western Australia, 2007. © Edward Burtynsky/Courtesy of Hasted Hunt Kraeutler, New York/Nicholas Metivier Gallery, Toronto
Silver Lake Operations #1, Lake Lefroy, Western Australia, 2007. © Edward Burtynsky/Courtesy of Hasted Hunt Kraeutler, New York/Nicholas Metivier Gallery, Toronto
VW Lot #2a & #2b, Shanghai, China, 2005. © Edward Burtynsky/Courtesy of Hasted Hunt Kraeutler, New York/Nicholas Metivier Gallery, Toronto
Oil Fields #13, Taft, California, USA 2002. © Edward Burtynsky/Courtesy of Hasted Hunt Kraeutler, New York/Nicholas Metivier Gallery, Toronto
Thank you, PDN, for reproducing these stunning images at a scale not usually associated with the internet. As I look at Mr. Burtynsky’s work here, and elsewhere, I’m glad that he has chosen to show them in the context of fine art rather than photojournalism, for although they inform us of various kinds of horror, they are also gorgeous. If presented as journalism, their beauty would likely overwhelm their evidence of ecological devastation. When shown as fine art, however, there is the chance that those attracted to them because of their beauty will learn something of the disaster they portend.
Nice, disturbing work. I hope it will inspire others to sell their cars, buy a bike and use public transportation. That’s what I did a year ago now and it’s very freeing.
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