The True Cost of Oil: Canada’s Oil Sands and the Last Great Forest

The True Cost of Oil: Canada’s Oil Sands and the Last Great Forest

By editorial and fine art photographer Garth Lenz

Presented by Environmental Defence Canada and Keepers of the Water

May 15 - June 1, 2024

FAB Gallery Main Floor

Reception

University of Alberta faculty, staff, students and invited guests
Thursday May 16, 2024 | 7:30 - 10 pm | FAB Gallery

About the exhibition

The True Cost of Oil exhibit by editorial and fine art photographer Garth Lenz, contrasts Alberta’s oil sands - one of the biggest industrial projects in the world - and the surrounding Boreal Forest, an essential carbon storehouse and home to countless, unique species. The oil sands, including the tailings “ponds” that hold toxic wastewater, a byproduct of production, are a growing environmental threat. They harm Alberta’s landscape, wildlife, and waterways. They endanger local communities’ health and way of life.

Garth’s aerial images capture the vast tar mines, tailings ponds, and refineries that lie in the middle of some of the world’s largest wetlands and remaining tracts of forest, serving as a visual metaphor for the cost of the world’s ongoing dependence on fossil fuels.

The True Cost of Oil invites viewers to consider the cost of this dependence and the damage already done – the scarred land, the boreal forest and peatlands ripped up, the compromised waterways – as well as the value of what’s left to safeguard and the importance of honouring the treaties, close relationship to the land and stewardship of local Indigenous Nations.

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Artist talk and panel discussion

Garth Lenz

editorial and fine art photographer

Cleo Reece

Keeper of the Water Elders Wisdom Council, Fort McMurray First Nation, Treaty 8 territory

Jean L’Hommecourt

Keepers of the Water co-chair, traditional land user, and a member of Fort McKay First Nation in Treaty 8 territory

On May 16, 6 pm in FAB 2-20 join us for an artist talk and presentation featuring photographer Garth Lenz and special guests, get a look out the passenger seat window, as he shares his airborne experience capturing images of the oil sands and the forest ecosystem from above the treeline.

Hear a firsthand account of what it’s like to live downstream of the oil industry and its damaging impacts from Cleo Reece, Keeper of the Water Elders Wisdom Council, Fort McMurray First Nation, and Jean L’Hommecourt, Keepers of the Water co-chair, traditional land user, and a member of Fort McKay First Nation, Treaty 8 territory.

Register Here for the Artist Talk & Panel

 

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