News & Events

From the river-port town of Chalon-sur-Saône in the Burgundy region of France - coined the birthplace of photography - to the Kodak processing plants in North America, School of Image Arts Assistant Professor Robert Burley has made it his career mission to chronicle the end of the film photographic age. His project "The Disappearance of Darkness" documents the closing of photographic plants and the opening up of the fast-changing digital photo technology.

"There is something very sad about the inescapable passing of this magical technology. The images Bob Burley has so remarkably created in his work capture and communicate the poetic way film photography has existed all these years. The question that arises is whether digital technology will be able to do the same," said Dr. Daniel Doz, Dean of the Faculty of Communication and Design (FCAD).

Prof. Burley presented his project at FCAD's SRC Seminar Series. With the various closings of Kodak manufacturing plants and the industry completely embracing digital imaging, Prof. Burley wanted to learn more about the plants and discover the stories behind them. He thinks of his project as "an investigation of changing technologies and how those changes will affect his creative practice."

"Bob Burley is a wonderful photographer and one of our most experienced photo faculty members. Like many of us, he began his career in the days of film-based, photochemical imaging, but he foresaw the impact of the digital revolution earlier than many. He realized that there was a very interesting story - and a correspondingly fascinating visual document - that could be written and produced about the end of one photographic era and the start of another," said Don Snyder, Chair of the School of Image Arts. "He has produced a unique visual record of industrial spaces and systems which no longer exist, and this record will grow in significance as photochemical imaging continues to disappear."

Prof. Burley's goal with this project was to create "an interpreted photographic record of a rapidly disappearing infrastructure dedicated to the production and use of photochemical materials." Over the past two years, Burley has been photographing factories that have manufactured photographic film and paper in Canada, the United States and Europe.

"Photography as I have known it is passing into history. For the last century photographic manufacturing has relied on an economy of scale that has been supported by mass markets including consumers, the media, the health sector, etc. As each of these markets shifts to digital imaging technologies, it becomes less viable for the traditional manufacturers to continue production," Prof. Burley said. "Unlike other artists' materials, it is very difficult to produce photographic products on a small scale. It's just too complex and expensive. The materials I have used throughout my career are not only falling out of mainstream use - they are disappearing and I can see a time in the future when they will no longer be available."

Prof. Burley is planning to end the project in summer 2008, with the intention of publishing his work in a book.