Faculty of Communication & Design

Representing the Faculty of Communication and Design, Image Arts professor Robert Burley is one of the eight academics from across the University receiving the 2012 Ryerson Faculty Service Award. Recipients of this award are nominated by a fellow member of their faculty based on their exceptional or distinguished service to a department, school, faculty and/or the university.

Burley has made an outstanding contribution to Ryerson and the FCAD community, and is responsible for a great amount of growth in the School of Image Arts related both to photography and the renovations of the Image Arts building. Burley, who is currently program director in the undergraduate program of Photographic Studies, played a vital role in the development and launch of FCAD’s first stand-alone graduate program, the MA in Photographic Preservation and Collections Management (PPCM). In fact, he was the first director of the graduate program. As part of this, he bridged a relationship between the School of Image Arts and the George Eastman House International Museum of Film and Photography in Rochester, New York. Burley also played a strong hand in the initial donation of the Black Star Collection, which has become part of the core collection at the Ryerson Image Gallery, and continues to have an ongoing role with the Gallery. In addition to his contributions to the School and Gallery, Burley has sat on numerous committees at the University, including the Provost’s Commission on Academic Restructuring in 2009/2010 and the hiring committees for both the Chair of the School of Image Arts and the Director of the Ryerson Image Gallery.

There is no question that Burley continues to be a driving force in strengthening the reputation of Ryerson University, the School of Image Arts, and the program in photographic studies both in Canada and internationally. In addition to his contributions at Ryerson, Burley’s reputation as a photographer has been equally exceptional and note worthy both in Canada and abroad. He recently received a SSHRC Research/Creation Grant in Fine Arts, which supports excellence in research in artistic disciplines, for his body of work titled The New Suburb: Hybrid Forms in Urban and Visual Culture. His work has been published, exhibited and collected in Canada, the US and Europe.

Much of Burley’s work and creative practice explores the relationships between nature, architecture and urban landscape through site-specific installations and video. Of particular note is Burley’s body of work related to the historical demise of Kodak facilities around the world over that past 6 years http://vimeo.com/35389773. His latest research and work on the subject ‘The Disappearance of Darkness: Photography at the end of the analog era” will be published in the fall of 2012.

Whether it is through his career as a photographer or through the wide range of contributions he has made at Ryerson and the School of Image Arts, Robert Burley has proven himself to be an exceptional educator, mentor and artist. There is no question that he well deserves the 2012 Faculty Service Award in the Faculty of Communication and Design.

To read more about Robert Burley and his work you can visit his website at: http://www.robertburley.com