Robert Burley (born March 18, 1957) is a Canadian photographer of architecture and the urban landscape. He is based in

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

, Canada, and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.

Life and work

Robert Burley grew up in rural Ontario in the town of Picton. He studied Media Studies at Ryerson Polytechnical Institute (now

Toronto Metropolitan University Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU or Toronto Met) is a public university, public research university located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The university's core campus is situated within the Garden District, Toronto, Garden District, although i ...

), Toronto (BAA 1980) and later pursued graduate studies in photography at the

School of the Art Institute of Chicago The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) is a private art school associated with the Art Institute of Chicago (AIC) in Chicago, Illinois. Tracing its history to an art students' cooperative founded in 1866, which grew into the museum and ...

(MFA 1986). While living in Chicago, Burley trained briefly with Hedrich-Blessing Photographers before returning to Toronto to establish Design Archive, a firm specializing in architectural photography. From 1997 to 2021 Burley was a professor at Ryerson University's School of Image Arts where he helped create new programs and resources related to photography. These include his contributions to the creation of Ryerson Library's Special Collections, the acquisition of the

Black Star (photo agency) Black Star, also known as Black Star Publishing Company, was started by refugees from Germany who had established photographic agencies there in the 1930s. Today it is a New York City-based photographic agency with offices in London and in White Pla ...

Collection, and his position as one of the founding Program Directors of the graduate program in Film + Photographic Preservation. Throughout his career, Burley has executed numerous commissioned and self-directed multi-year projects realized as books and exhibitions. These include: * ''O’Hare: Airfield on the Prairie'' (Chicago History Museum 1989) * ''Viewing Olmsted: Photographs by Robert Burley, Lee Friedlander and Geoffrey James'' (Canadian Centre for Architecture 1997) * ''The Disappearance of Darkness: Photography at the end of the analog era'' (Princeton Architectural Press 2014) * ''An Enduring Wilderness: Toronto’s Natural Parklands'' (ECW Press 2017) * ''An Accidental Wilderness: The Origins and Ecology of Toronto’s Tommy Thompson Park'' (University of Toronto Press 2020)

Selected Collections

National Gallery of Canada The National Gallery of Canada (french: Musée des beaux-arts du Canada), located in the capital city of Ottawa, Ontario, is Canada's national art museum. The museum's building takes up , with of space used for exhibiting art. It is one of the l ...

Yale University Art Gallery The Yale University Art Gallery (YUAG) is the oldest university art museum in the Western Hemisphere. It houses a major encyclopedic collection of art in several interconnected buildings on the campus of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. ...

* Art Gallery of Hamilton *George Eastman Museum *Library Archives Canada *Fotomuseum Antwerpen *Canadian Centre for Architecture *Chicago History Museum *City of Toronto Archives *Doris McCarthy Gallery, University of Toronto *Musée Nicéphore Niépce, France *Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal *Ryerson Image Centre *Vancouver Art Gallery

Awards

* 2010: Mellon Senior Fellow – Canadian Centre for Architecture * 2018: Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada * 2018: Planning Excellence Award – Publication, Canadian Institute of Planners *2020: Award of Excellence – Research – The Canadian Society of Landscape Architects *2021: Heritage Toronto Award – Book – Accidental Wilderness: The Origins and Ecology of Toronto's Tommy Thompson Park

References

External links

*
Robert Burley: Photographic Proof
at

Canadian Centre for Architecture The Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA; french: Centre Canadien d'Architecture) is a Architecture museum, museum of architecture and research centre in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is located at 1920, rue Baile (1920, Baile Street), between r ...

From the End of the Analog Era to the Enduring Wilderness
Robert Burley's interview on

LensCulture ''LensCulture'' is a photography network and online magazine about contemporary photography in art, media, politics, commerce and popular cultures worldwide. It is based in Amsterdam, Netherlands. ''LensCulture'' sponsors international photograph ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Burley, Robert 20th-century Canadian photographers 21st-century Canadian photographers Architectural photographers People from Prince Edward County, Ontario Photography academics Toronto Metropolitan University alumni Academic staff of Toronto Metropolitan University School of the Art Institute of Chicago alumni 1957 births Living people Artists from Toronto Fellows of the Royal Society of Canada