Capture Photography Festival presents its fifth Speaker Series talk with artist Edward Burtynsky, in conversation with Audain Art Museum, Whistler Director and Chief Curator Curtis Collins and Capture Photography Festival Executive Director & Chief Curator Emmy Lee Wall. Join us for a discussion of Burtynsky’s recent works as part of the The Coast Mountains: Recent Works by Edward Burtynsky exhibition at the Audain Art Museum, Whistler from April 27 to September 15, 2025.
This event is part of the 2025 Capture Photography Festival Speaker Series and is presented by Capture Photography Festival in partnership with the Audain Art Museum, Whistler and the Audain Faculty of Art at Emily Carr University of Art + Design and is generously supported by Bruce Munro Wright. Capture’s 2025 Speaker Series is generously supported by Wesgroup.
This event is free. If you would like to make a donation to support Capture Photography Festival, please donate via our registered charitable organization Vancouver Association for Photographic Arts here. Amounts greater than $20.00 will receive a tax receipt.
About the participants
Edward Burtynsky is regarded as one of the world's most accomplished contemporary photographers. His remarkable photographic depictions of global industrial landscapes represent over 40 years of his dedication to bearing witness to the impact of humans on the planet. Burtynsky's photographs are included in the collections of over 80 major museums around the world. Major (touring) exhibitions include: BURTYNSKY: Extraction/Abstraction (2024) which premiered at London’s Saatchi Gallery; Anthropocene (2018); Water (2013) organized by the New Orleans Museum of Art & Contemporary Art Center, Louisiana; Oil (2009) at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington D.C.; China (2005 five-year tour); and Manufactured Landscapes (2003) at the National Gallery of Canada. Burtynsky’s distinctions include the inaugural TED Prize in 2005, which he shared with Bono and Robert Fischell; the Governor General’s Awards in Visual and Media Arts; the Outreach Award at the Rencontres d’Arles; the Roloff Beny Book award; and the 2018 Photo London Master of Photography Award. In 2019 he was the recipient of the Arts & Letters Award at the Canadian Association of New York’s annual Maple Leaf Ball and the 2019 Lucie Award for Achievement in Documentary Photography. In 2020 he was awarded a Royal Photographic Society Honorary Fellowship and in 2022 was honoured with the Outstanding Contribution to Photography Award by the World Photography Organization. In 2022 he was inducted into
the International Photography Hall of Fame and was named the 2022 recipient for the annual Pollution Probe Award. Most recently he received the 2023 PHotoESPAÑA Award for Professional Career and was awarded with the 25th edition of the Pino Pascali Prize. Burtynsky was also a key production figure in the award-winning documentary trilogy Manufactured Landscapes (dir. Jennifer Baichwal, 2006), Watermark (dir. Baichwal and Burtynsky, 2013), and ANTHROPOCENE: The Human Epoch (dir. Baichwal, Nicholas de Pencier, and Burtynsky, 2018). All three films continue to play in festivals around the world. Burtynsky currently holds nine honorary doctorate degrees.
Curtis Collins is the Director and Chief Curator of the Audain Art Museum (AAM) in Whistler, BC. Collins received his PhD from the Department of Art History and Communications Studies at McGill University in Montreal. He has served as a director and curator for a variety of institutions across Canada, including the Beaverbrook Art Gallery, Art Gallery of Algoma, and Dunlop Art Gallery. Dr. Collins has also been active as an educator at MacEwan University, the Yukon School of Visual Arts, and First Nations University of Canada. His curatorial projects at the AAM include Reservoir by Rebecca Belmore, the national touring exhibition Wolves: The Art of Dempsey Bob, and CURVE! Women Carvers on the Northwest Coast. His recent curatorial projects at the AAM include the national touring exhibition Wolves: The Art of Dempsey Bob, Karin Bubaš: Garden of Shadows and Curve! Women Carvers on the Northwest Coast.
Emmy Lee Wall is Executive Director and Chief Curator of Capture Photography Festival and prior to that worked at the Vancouver Art Gallery for more than a decade where she worked on numerous historical and contemporary exhibitions. Her curatorial practice has a particular focus on art in public spaces and she has worked on public art projects with a diverse range of local and international artists including Vikky Alexander, Elisabeth Belliveau, Douglas Coupland, Sara Cwynar, Moyra Davey, Christopher Lacroix, Michael Lin, Anique Jordan, Meryl McMaster, Krystle Coughlin Silverfox, Steven Shearer, Shellie Zhang, and Elizabeth Zvonar.
