Diane Burko Essay

Upon seeing the work of Diane Burko, I was immediately struck by how visually appealing it was. I loved the the soft colors and the crisp yet uniquely organic forms. It’s difficult to argue that Burko isn’t a skilled painter; however, as an artist, I felt Burko was somewhat problematic. Burko’s presentation gave a chronological retelling of her creative life starting from her early education, in which she studied painting. Soon after graduating, Burko began to travel, and eventually started creating landscape paintings from aerial photographs. It wasn’t until much later in 2006 that Burko’s work “found” meaning; she became concerned with environmental issues, specifically climate change, which led to a complete rebranding of her artwork. Burko transitioned from painting volcanoes and waterfalls and began honing in on specific, often controversial topics: receding glaciers, melting ice and coral reefs. What’s concerning about Burko’s work isn’t the work itself. I personally love the paintings she creates; I especially enjoy her pieces depicting different areas of the Arctic Circle using crackle. It’s her backwards creative process, the notion of taking a hot-button issue and applying it to the art after the fact. I feel that a large part of creating meaningful art is depicting issues
Burko didn’t really come across as an environmental activist; yes, she may in fact be raising awareness for the issue of climate change in some form, but I feel that the heart of the issue is the small differences we can make as individuals to preserve the planet. I would have loved to hear more about Burko’s background as an environmentalist rather than a painter, for her to further explain her role as an activist and discuss how art addresses the issue better than, perhaps, building solar panels and wind turbines or funding research surrounding climate change and its