TYLER BURKE - EXPOSURE EMERGING PHOTOGRAPHERS SHOWCASE

I started shooting street photography in Calgary during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.

I think the pull I first felt - and still feel - towards making street photographs comes from a need to subdue a bit of the arbitrariness that so easily envelopes my life. I feel this default arbitrariness often as anxiety: like standing at a trailhead that branches into a thousand paths with no map while a subconscious impetus urges me to desperately get moving. The imposition of values - aesthetic values in the case of photography - has been like a therapeutic, anti-entropic tool; choosing a path becomes a meaningful, creative process. 

Street photography allows me to investigate my immediate environment and place a scaffolding of order over small, undisturbed pieces of it. Perhaps part and parcel to this approach, I seek out clean architectural lines, and harsh sun-shadow distinctions to contextualize - and paradoxically, to also render abstract - everyday scenes of life unfolding.

BIOGRAPHY

Tyler A.W. Burke was born and raised in NE Calgary. He realized his affinity for creative activities early in life, growing up drawing, painting, writing, and making music. After completing a bachelor’s degree he deviated from a path that was leading to law school. It was during this period that he reconnected with music and began experimenting with photography and filmmaking. He has been working as a commercial photographer, filmmaker, and copywriter for the last three years.

In 2019 he began a daily photographic practice that he has maintained until the present day: in addition to his work for clients he takes at least one photograph for himself everyday. Part self-therapy, part artistic exploration, this daily practice quickly developed into a fixation on street photography; he has been working on developing his contribution to this genre since spring 2020.

His participation in the Exposure Festival 2022 Emerging Photographers Showcase marks his first public exhibition of his street photography work.