Robert Koch Gallery is pleased to announce Edward Burtynsky: Transformation, featuring monumental color photographs that examine landscapes altered by resource extraction, manufacturing, rapid development, and the ecological changes that follow. These works continue Burtynsky’s ongoing exploration of how human intervention has reshaped natural environments worldwide, revealing both their vulnerability and magnificence.

Edward Burtynsky: Transformation opens concurrent to The Great Acceleration, Burtynsky’s exhibition at the International Center of Photography in New York, presently on view through September 28, 2025. Timed to coincide with Climate Week NYC in September 2025, this landmark presentation, curated by David Campany, marks Burtynsky’s first major institutional exhibition in New York City in over twenty years. It is accompanied by a monograph by the ICP / Steidl.

The exhibition embodies Burtynsky’s decades-long pursuit of capturing the profound and often permanent changes human industry brings to the earth’s surface. Each project remains intrinsically linked, showing how local environmental changes reflect broader global patterns, documenting the visible effects on the land brought on by demographic expansion, water consumption, carbon emissions, and mineral extraction. “At such a critical moment in time, I hope this work sparks meaningful dialogue about our relationship with the planet and brings more people to this awareness,” reflects Burtynsky on his mission to document our changing world.

Images included in the exhibition range from retreating glaciers in British Columbia’s Coast Mountains, which reflect the impact of climate change on ice caps, to cobalt mining operations in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, illustrating the lasting marks of human resource extraction on the land. Burtynsky’s image of Lake Mead, Nevada depicts receding waterways brought on by prolonged drought and increasing water demand, highlighting the strain on vital resources in the American West. Burtynsky’s recent 2024 photographs of Olympic National Park, Washington capture the effects of increased rainfall in the region’s remote wilderness areas. His work depicting Thjorsá River, Iceland captures the intricate patterns formed by glacial meltwater as it meanders through Iceland’s volcanic landscape, caused by climate change. Collectively, these images form a powerful visual narrative of our planet’s rapid transformation.

Burtynsky’s work was the subject of the award-winning documentary trilogy Manufactured Landscapes (dir. Jennifer Baichwal, 2006), Watermark (dir. Baichwal and Burtynsky, 2013), and ANTHROPOCENE: The Human Epoch (dir. Baichwal, Nicholas de Pencier, and Burtynsky, 2018).

Burtynsky has dedicated over 40 years to documenting human impact on the planet. His works are held in the collections of over eighty museums worldwide, including the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Museum of Modern Art and Guggenheim, New York; Tate, London; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid; and the National Gallery of Canada, among other notable international institutions. Major institutional exhibitions include BURTYNSKY: Extraction/Abstraction (2024), premiered at Saatchi Gallery, London, before touring to M9, Mestre, Italy; Anthropocene (2018), Art Gallery of Ontario and National Gallery of Canada (international tour); Water (2013), New Orleans Museum of Art and Contemporary Art Center, Louisiana (international tour); Oil (2009), Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (five-year international tour); China (2005–2008, international tour); Manufactured Landscapes (2003–2005), National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa (toured to Art Gallery of Ontario and Brooklyn Museum); and Breaking Ground (1988–1992), produced by the Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography (international tour).

His accolades include the inaugural TED Prize (2005); the ICP Infinity Award (2008); the Kraszna Krausz Book Award (2010); the Lucie Award for Achievement in Documentary Photography (2011); the Outreach Award at Rencontres d’Arles (2011); the Photo London Master of Photography Award (2018); the Outstanding Contribution to Photography Award from the World Photography Organisation (2022); and his induction into the International Photography Hall of Fame (2022), among others.  Burtynsky was awarded the title of Officer of the Order of Canada in 2006 and currently holds nine honorary doctorate degrees.