Seen from above, in photographs and films by Edward Burtynsky or Peter Mettler, the Alberta tar sands appear as Earth-scale inkblots, their forests cut clear and soil scraped clean, their ink spilled into smooth tailing ponds carved out in straight lines and graceful curves. They are at once beautiful and terrifying, geometric and enigmatic, lyrical and dreadful. In a word: sublime.
Burtynsky has described his oil photographs as “a bit like a Rorschach test.” Where some see the power of human ingenuity and economic opportunity, others see environmental destruction and exploitation. It’s a sensible explanation, but it also understates the power of these images. Photographs may be open to interpretation, but they also guide it. Oil companies have long known this and have learned that some images and interpretations should simply be avoided. Not surprisingly, many have been reticent to...
Brian Jacobson is an assistant professor of cinema studies and history at the University of Toronto. His writing about media, energy, and the environment has appeared in The Atlantic, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Film Quarterly, and other places.
Advertisement
Advertisement