Kyler Zeleny: Bury Me in the Back 40

Kyler Zeleny: Bury Me in the Back 40 by Aline SmithsonSeptember 10, 2024

©Kyler Zeleny, Cover of Bury Me In The Back Forth, published by Fall Line Press

Kyler Zeleny has a particular way of seeing the world, or more specifically, seeing the Canadian prairie, that is both historical and theatrical, cinematic and apocalyptic. When combined, the results are riveting. His newest book effort is the the final chapter in his prairie trilogy. Bury Me in the Back Forty, published by The Velvet Cell, is the successor to the sold-out books “Out West” and “Crown Ditch”. His unique approach to combing text and image, vintage and contemporary photographs and ephemera, oral histories and community records, make Bury Me in the Back Forty a rich narrative of prairie life.

Kyler Zeleny (1988) is a Canadian photographer, educator and author of Out West (2014), Found Polaroids (2017), Crown Ditch & The Prairie Castle (2020), and Bury Me in the Back Forty (2024). He holds a bachelor’s degree in Political Science from the University of Alberta, a master’s degree from Goldsmiths College, in Photography and Urban Cultures and a PhD from the joint Communication & Culture program at Ryerson and York University. His work has been exhibited internationally in twelve countries and has been featured in numerous publications including The Globe & Mail, The Guardian, The Washington Post, Vice, and The Independent. He occupies his time byexploring photography on the Canadian prairies.

Instagram: @kylerzeleny

©Kyler Zeleny, Spread from Bury Me in the Back Forty

Bury Me in the Back Forty

For a decade now, I’ve been documenting my hometown, a rural community on the Canadian Prairies with deep Ukrainian roots, consisting of 915 people. Based on the idea that the story of any place evolves over time, I’ve been using my own photographs, collected objects, community archives, and hidden histories, to revise the community’s history book from the year 1980. The result is a pluralistic history of the community that embraces both official and unofficial accounts of events in the community’s past—a community album that contains not only the roses but also the numerous thorns attached to each stem. It encapsulates the collective virtues and vices found at the heart of any complex place on the verge of disappearing. More importantly, it is simply a story being recorded, recollected, and reconfigured—a layered portrait of small town living that is both unique and universal. The result of which is the stoicism of place, a lived existence, which roars at times and suffers so quietly at others.