Mountain photography that motivates

The Canadian Rockies: Rediscovered
Photographs by Paul Zizka

Victoria: Rocky Mountain Books, 2025
$40  /  9781771607391

Reviewed by Ron Dart

*

Paul Zizka’s compelling and creative images in The Canadian Rockies: Rediscovered are in the highest reach of “A” level evocative photographs. The front cover of the book, ice climber ascending, soft purple northern lights backdrop, focused light on the climber a definite promise and hint of visual beauties to come—such creatively distinct approaches to the Rockies summon forth, for those who have lingered long in such enticing grails of the soul, a longing to return to deeper places. 

All of the photographs, as the title of the book suggests, are from the Canadian Rockies, but none to this point in Canadian photographic history have depicted and described the Rockies in such mesmerizing detail. Most of the photos come from the Banff environs, but Mount Assiniboine, Mount Robson, Yoho, Lake Louise, Jasper and Crowsnest Pass, White Goat Wilderness Area, Kananaskis Country and Kootenay National Park, definitely and decidedly, bring together a multiplicity of “under-documented” perspectives of the Canadian Rockies. The sheer creative breadth and depth of the photographs, all seasons and varied terrain covered, make for a must meditative sit-and-see. I have been fortunate, in my many trips to the Rockies, to visit the diverse and varied sites Paul Zizka so well illuminates but he has raised the bar to a much higher level for those longing to see much more that the Rockies has yet to offer (with some effort, of course).

The obvious creative photography that covers ice climbing, skating on lakes in the day and nighttime, peak ascents, appealing poses from attractive angles, self-portraits, models doing their posing deeds well, ice ax and ski descents, ski touring inside and outside glaciers—and night photos of the highest quality, headlamps making for many a surreal photo, some standard photographs, many a rare photograph of Banff, dramatic nature and multi-coloured northern lights replete and ample in rare and not to be repeated photographs, star studded night skies, kayaks on lakes, and much else living theatre in photographic motion. This is a book for anyone interested in a more full and nuanced approach to the Rockies, beyond must-have trendy tourist photographs. Each page is another keen surprise to the eye.

A foreword by Dave Brosha is an insightful overview into Zizka’s photographic journey and inspiration to others, as is the must-read introduction by Paul Zizka. Here his artistic vision and changing approaches to photography articulated and explained, thoughtfully and suggestively. “Perhaps the most significant shift in my photography since Summits & Starlight has been the addition of the human element in my images,” Zizka notes. “I have been –and remain—fascinated by how much one can convey through the interplay of people and wilderness”. There can be no doubt that many of the finest photographs in this library of highest quality images bring together nature and the human journey in an exquisite and not to be forgotten manner.

Dave Brosha, I think, sums up as much when he suggests, rightly so, that “Paul hasn’t just created a compelling collection of images from a place. He has—in my mind—set the creative standard for a body of work from the Canadian Rockies, and the influence of many of the images within this collection can’t be understated. Paul’s style is one of epic grandeur.”

The combination of epic and grandeur is an apt and poignant way to sum up the rare and unique photographs in The Canadian Rockies: Rediscovered—there can be not a shade of doubt that Paul has certainly rediscovered the Rockies in a way none have yet done and those who sit with this bounty of pure gold photography will, necessarily so, see the Rockies again in a new way. But, to do so, they will need to make the trips and do the treks, in the daytime and night time, to places Paul has gone to see such sights. These photographs are very much icons pointing to what the Rockies offer to the curious and committed.  

I was fortunate in the early 1970s to spend time with the Mountain Sami in northern Norway. Many were the nights spent under the aurora borealis, their dramatic shifts of colour from green to purple to soft red to mild blue, intense for a short season, seemingly disappearing, then returning again in all their show time season—and, of course, the star-packed sky in the long winter nights made for a fine companion to the borealis, constellation of the night whispering an ancient tale.  Many are the photographs in The Canadian Rockies: Rediscovered that linger with the lamps of the night and the drama of the aurora—again, as I began this short review, a definite “A” level book that needs to be inwardly digested and returned to, like epic literature, many, many times.

montani semper liberi

*

Ron Dart has taught in the Department of Political Science, Philosophy, and Religious Studies at the University of the Fraser Valley since 1990. He was on staff with Amnesty International in the 1980s. He has published 40 books including Erasmus: Wild Bird (Create Space, 2017) and The North American High Tory Tradition (American Anglican Press, 2016). [Editor’s note: Ron Dart has recently reviewed books by Glenn Woodsworth & David Woodsworth, Marc Bourdon, Paul Zizka, John Baldwin, Diane Kalen-Sukra, and Stanley Munn & Patricia Cucman for The British Columbia Review. He has also contributed five essays: Milton Acorn, Canadian mountain culture and mountaineering, From Jalna to Timber Baron: Reflections on the life of H.R. MacMillan, Roderick Haig-Brown & Al Purdy, and Save Swiss Edelweiss Village.]

*

The British Columbia Review

Interim Editors, 2023-26: Trevor Marc Hughes (non-fiction), Brett Josef Grubisic (fiction)
Publisher: Richard Mackie

Formerly The Ormsby Review, The British Columbia Review is an on-line book review and journal service for BC writers and readers. The Advisory Board now consists of Jean Barman, Wade Davis, Robin Fisher, Barry Gough, Hugh Johnston, Kathy Mezei, Patricia Roy, and Graeme Wynn. Provincial Government Patron (since September 2018): Creative BC. Honorary Patron: Yosef Wosk. Scholarly Patron: SFU Graduate Liberal Studies. The British Columbia Review was founded in 2016 by Richard Mackie and Alan Twigg.

“Only connect.” – E.M. Forster