Nickel Tailings #34 and #35, Sudbury, Ontario
Two large-scale chromogenic prints placed side by side reveal the otherworldly, rust-red landscape of nickel tailings left behind by decades of industrial mining near Sudbury, Ontario. Burtynsky's aerial perspective transforms the toxic waste deposits into a hauntingly beautiful abstraction, where rich crimson and ochre hues ripple across the earth like a painter's canvas. The diptych format amplifies the vast scale of environmental extraction, inviting viewers to grapple with the tension between industrial sublime and ecological consequence.
- Medium
- Chromogenic print diptych.
- Location
- Phillips, Salt Lake City, UT
- Spotted At
- Auction House · PhillipsView on map
🔨 Auction Lot
Photographs
October 1, 2014
Artists in conversation
Andreas Gursky
German · b. 1955
Gursky creates large scale color photography that transforms industrial and man altered landscapes into sweeping abstract compositions, sharing Burtynsky's aerial perspective and the tension between beauty and critique of human impact on the environment.
Richard Misrach
American · b. 1949
Misrach's Desert Cantos and Petrochemical America series use chromogenic color photography to document toxic and industrially scarred landscapes with similarly rich earth tones and an ominous yet sublime mood rooted in ecological critique.
David Maisel
American · b. 1961
Maisel's aerial photographs of mining sites, evaporation ponds, and environmental sacrifice zones produce eerily beautiful abstract color fields strikingly similar to Burtynsky's nickel tailings, blending Anthropocene themes with painterly visual abstraction.
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