Artist and ECU faculty member Gonzalo Reyes Rodriguez is the recipient of a 2023 New Generation Photography Award.

Speaking via email, Gonzalo says that, once the initial shock wore off, he was “elated” to receive the news of his recognition.

“I didn’t think I would win because I am not a ‘capital P’ photographer,” he tells me. “But when I looked back at previous winners, the award is not as strict in its definition of the medium. The award itself is such a fantastic opportunity for artists working with photography and photographic images. I don’t know of any others like it. It’s an honour to be included in the history of recipients, especially to be a recipient living in Vancouver, a city with a storied relationship to photography.”

Launched in 2017 by the National Gallery of Canada (NGC) in partnership with Scotiabank, the annual New Generation Photography Award (NGPA) supports the careers of Canadian artists aged 35 and under by recognizing outstanding photographic images. Winners receive $10,000 and an opportunity to show at Arsenal Contemporary Art Toronto as part of the Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival, as well as in a special exhibition at the NGC.

Andrea Kunard, senior curator of photographs at the NGC and chair of the Scotiabank NGPA jury, is curating both exhibitions. The 2023 jury was composed of Deanna Bowen, artist and past Scotiabank Photography Award winner, Marisa Kriangwiwat Holmes, artist and past NGPA winner, and curator Bernard Lamarche of the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec. Andrea, Deanna and Marisa are all ECU alums.

Of the 2023 recipients, Gonzalo stands out as the only one working with found and archival photographs. He recalls a teacher in grad school telling the class that “99.9 per cent of the photographs in the world will never be printed.”

At the time, Gonzalo was already “losing interest in taking photographs.” Consequently, he’d begun experimenting in film, video and sculpture. He points to artists including Harun Farocki, Akram Zaatari, Cindy Sherman, Richard Prince, Sarah Charlesworth, Louise Lawler and Alan McCullum as influential to his research into how photography might “critique and speak back to hegemonic social and political structures.” Ultimately, this inquiry led to a decision to stop making new photographs, period.

“I stopped taking pictures because I didn’t need to; there were so many all around me that I could turn into material and work with,” Gonzalo says. “What resonates with me is how found images are materials that address the language of representation and the conventions by which photography describes and orders the world around us. I’m interested in highlighting the meaning already existent in these images, and the politics in which images function in our everyday lives. It’s about addressing representation itself as an existent form, as something to look at.”

Gonzalo says he aims to be in the studio through the summer. He is currently preparing new work and readying himself for upcoming exhibitions. He will be showing in a group exhibition at Universidad de las Américas Puebla as part of Bienal Sur and in the NGPA exhibitions at the NGC and at Arsenal Contemporary Art.

Visit Gonzalo’s website to learn more about his work.

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Visit ECU online to learn more about studying Photography at Emily Carr.