As part of a new series of essays taking inspiration from the Alternator archive, Lucas Glenn connects with Andreas Rutkauskas to explore the representation of the climate in creative practice.

Kettle River Recreation Area, photographed by Rutkauskas in 2018 (three years after the fire). Image courtesy of the artist.

The burns peel. Bits fall to the ground. I remind myself it’s part of the cycle.

The bark on these aspens is seared from over 4,000 hectares of human-caused wildfire. Nine years ago, this valley was filled with smoke and flames. But by the look of their foliage, the aspens are recovering fast. I can see their bright green leaves as I drive past.

Taking in the scenery, I feel a sense of loss. The open landscape is dotted with bare and blackened trees. The fire consumed farmland, plants, campsites, homes, and range for many species. I experience a familiar sadness when I think about old growth cottonwoods rendered to ash. I think about the birds that nested in their cavities. Lynx, the deer, and raccoons relied on their canopy, too. Grappling with the effects of wildfire is becoming more and more familiar for those in this region.

Highway 3 leads me to Rock Creek, a small community in the Thompson-Okanagan. My family and I are driving out to visit my aunt and uncle who live here. Their creekside hobby farm is on the traditional, unceded territory of the syilx and Secwepemc peoples. We are all settlers and lucky to be here. I’m looking forward to seeing my aunt and uncle, as well as the dogs and horses. The critters, as they call them. I’m especially excited to meet Sophie, the new puppy.

*After the Fire* (2021), a photo-based installation by artist Andreas Rutkauskas at the Alternator Centre for Contemporary Art’s Window Gallery. Image courtesy of the Alternator.

I’ve been exchanging emails with photo-based artist and researcher Andreas Rutkauskas. Rutkauskas is currently based in the Okanagan valley and lectures at UBC’s Okanagan campus. His work has a rich exhibition history, earning him national and international awards. Our conversations centre around the region, its arts and culture, and After the Fire, a project he developed between 2017 and 2021.

In 2021, I was introduced to his work at the Alternator Centre for Contemporary Art, the longest running artist-run centre in interior BC. Rutkauskas’ installation, also titled After the Fire, consisted mostly of photo cut-outs that stretch from floor to ceiling of a 24x8 foot display case. The cut-out images depicted burned pine trees. Tree silhouettes on the case’s glass added an extra dimension. The trees were in various stages of renewal. I could see loss, but I could also see healing.

Lucas Glenn:

Your series After the Fire involves photographic prints and installations that document the aftermath of wildfires throughout western Canada. The series provides us with an alternative view of wildfire; that it is a process and a cycle. But by not shying away from its destructive potential, you also validate losses felt across Okanagan communities. ‘Natural’ or not, devastating or not, and even as climate change intensifies, fire has always played a role here.

With your history— growing up in Treaty 1 Territory (Winnipeg), spending 12 years in Montréal, and living just over a year in Canmore before moving to Kelowna— place has a place in your practice. What led you to create After the Fire in 2017, so shortly after moving to unceded syilx territory?

Andreas Rutkauskas:

I am always in the habit of thinking about how I can make work in a new place. Whether that was Montréal, the Bow Valley, or the Okanagan. I try to use art as a means of opening up and getting to know a place.

The summer of 2017 was an exceptional fire season, and when a spot fire ignited on Knox Mountain, I grabbed my camera. I was curious to witness firsthand what the aftermath of a fire looked like. Only a few days after the fire, and with no precipitation, bunchgrasses were already regenerating. This astonished me, and taught me that the Okanagan is a fire-adapted ecosystem. And while it’s common knowledge to many who reside in the area, it’s a principle that is overlooked by others.

Most subjects I have gravitated towards in my practice involve polarized political outlooks. Upon arriving in the Okanagan, I had just completed a three-year long project documenting the Canada/U.S. border. I was investigating the misconception that it is “the world’s longest undefended land boundary.” In reality it’s heavily monitored through subtle technologies like remote sensing and thermal imaging. I also completed Petrolia in 2013. The project juxtaposes industrial oil production in the so-called Chemical Valley in southwestern Ontario with small-scale “oil farmers.” These smaller operators use 19th century technology to draw crude from their wells.

The topic of wildfire nests neatly into [my practice’s] history. Wildfire is often presented as a destructive force in popular media, yet it is also a natural phenomenon. Traditions of cultural burning have existed since time immemorial on nearly every continent.

Lucas Glenn:

Your work does have a closeness to polarized topics, but has a distance worth noting, too. Abandoned oil refineries and quietly monitored and liminal spaces along the US-Canada borders. After the Fire— with a few interesting exceptions like your photos of Mt Christie (2020) and Mt Eneas (2017)— depicts the slow growth that follows a fiery spectacle. Your investigations connect to conflict, but shy away from sensationalism.

Rutkauskas:

When I began making images of fire, I was attracted to the sensational. In fact, the image of the Mt. Eneas fire was made during my first summer exploring the subject. My archive includes images of burned homes, as well as photography and footage of active fires. However, as I sifted through images and developed my own perspective, it became important that my images act against the dominant media rhetoric. For this reason, I left out images that overlap with what the public (or gallery-goer) can see in news media or social media.

Additionally, my project’s equipment, a 4x5” view camera that captures images on colour negative film, was too unwieldy for this. A digital camera with a telephoto lens would be better for creating up-close-and-personal shots of the devastating effects of wildfire that we see through other channels. With the After the Fire series, I feel my approach with a view camera speaks more directly to the slow violence of climate change. It is a slow process, just as the scars of fire can be slow to heal. I enjoy the possibility that my images engage with a longer timescale.

Glenn:

I first encountered the subject matter of After the Fire in a window exhibition at the Alternator. But in the context of film photography, it struck me as non-traditional— even sculptural— in the way it was layered and installed.

Artist-run centres like this tend to support artists who think and/or make in alternative ways. The Alternator is itself in an alternative location, in regards to contemporary art culture. Even in Canadian art, Kelowna is at the margins. I wonder if this regional specificity is the reason the Alternator has become a steward for topics that impact the region.

Rutkauskas:

It is especially important that artist-run centres offer space for those who make work that doesn’t fit within the [traditional] discourse. A lot of artists make work about environmental topics, but the regionality and site-specificity is the important piece. Living in a place that is directly impacted, as well as witnessing and sharing your work within your community, is how the work remains vital and unique.

I have found a meaningful connection to the arts community through the Alternator. A number of years ago, I began documenting every exhibition in the main gallery and project space. This has afforded me an opportunity to engage intimately with practices of both local and visiting artists. The gallery’s mandate supports students that I mentor directly through UBC Okanagan. And I perceive it as an inviting space for all community members.

Arts institutions are investing in programs to open up cultural spaces to diverse audiences, but perceived barriers hinder many from setting foot through the door. Barriers include a lack of formal gallery-goer education, and a lack of LGBTQ+ and BIPOC representation. That representation may not just be among artists, but employees and community members as well. Contemporary art’s elite culture impacts the reception of real-world ideas that artists investigate. Including topics like environment and climate change.

Glenn:

What do you find unique about the Okanagan?

Rutkauskas:

It is a stunning place, and I am grateful to be a guest in the Okanagan. It can be a subtle place, where you need to look closely to make discoveries. This suits my practice.

The Okanagan is also a land of contrasts, in terms of ecology and social landscape. There is desert, grassland, open canopy pine forest and temperate rainforest. There are settler-colonial and Indigenous collaborations, but also tensions. There are ecologically minded artists and poets, but also people who are only here to recreate in destructive ways. There are also tensions between immigrants and settlers who clash in political and religious terms.

Glenn:

I find the dominant view/culture here is in conflict with the health of the region’s ecosystems. I like to think it’s changing, but our media still sells the Okanagan as a nature-space for a sporty, outdoor-loving culture. This has violent implications. When we see nature as a separate space— one us humans can choose to visit or not, take part in or not — we don’t see its exploitation as our own exploitation. And as long as we see nature as elsewhere, we can’t understand it as shared.

Stories that separate nature from (human) culture are convenient for extraction and leisure. But climate change reminds us that the separations are fictional. Many Indigenous worldviews remind us the separations are a relatively new type of fiction, too. Human and nonhuman systems have always been deeply connected.

Rutkauskas:

The dismantling of the preconception of the Okanagan as a four-season playground is challenging. Tourism plays a massive role in the economy and comes with environmental burdens as well as tension between the local community and temporary visitors. This comes to a head in terms of wildfire when area evacuations take place, and travel restrictions are imposed or suggested. Some of those from outside the area, or with secondary properties in the Okanagan want to recreate during their planned vacations, regardless of environmental conditions and this can be challenging to contend with, however, most are respectful as evidenced by the aftermath of the 2023 Grouse Mountain complex fires.

I turn off the Crowsnest highway onto a dirt road. We arrive at the ranch and walk down to the river bank while talking about the animals, the heat, and the first sunflower crop.

At the river, my brother and I skip stones. The conditions are right; no fish in sight, and the rocks here are perfectly formed. It’s a comedic performance when we try to skip the huge stones, and we laugh as most drop straight in. But we ooh and ahh as some hit the water a second or even third time. We tire ourselves out.

With the energy I have left, I try to play fetch with Sophie. She takes the stick and splashes around in the water— she doesn’t understand the concept yet. Still, I make it crystal clear to her that she is a good dog. I tell her many times before she runs off to play with the horses in their pasture.

Patches of fireweed are blooming in the soil across the river. The next generation of cottonwoods and aspens is growing fast.

Andreas Rutkauskas uses photography, video and other media to depict landscapes undergoing transformation. His work has focused on the Canada/U.S. border, petroleum extraction, and the aftermath and regeneration following wildfires. Andreas currently teaches photography at the University of British Columbia’s Okanagan campus on unceded Syilx territory.

Lucas Glenn (b. 1992, Winfield, BC) is a writer, visual artist, and designer based in unceded syilx territory. He received his MFA from University of Victoria. His research interests include ecology, tech, and do-it-yourself culture. Glenn continues to write and exhibit throughout Western Canada.

After the fire // Lucas Glenn

Community built.
Artist run.