🎙️ Welcome to Ep. #71 of The Urbanaut Podcast, presented in collaboration with Urbanautica.com. In this compelling episode, we welcome Canadian photographer and educator Kate Schneider, whose emotionally resonant work explores the deep ties between land, memory, and identity. From the protest camps of the American Midwest to intimate still lifes of ancient rocks, Kate’s evolving visual language challenges traditional documentary practice and embraces poetic, sensory experience.

About Our Guest: Kate Schneider

Kate Schneider is an artist of settler ancestry living in Tkaronto (Toronto), deeply rooted in the ecology and history of the Great Lakes region. With a background in both photojournalism and fine art, her practice traverses multiple disciplines, from long-form documentary to deeply personal and experimental photographic works. Kate's recent series—How to Understand a Rock, We, the Heartland, and Landscapes of Resistance—meditate on protest, place, and the unspoken emotional geographies that shape our relationships with the non-human world. Her work has been widely exhibited across North America and published internationally. She also teaches photography at OCAD University in Toronto.

Tune in to this episode to:

• Discover how neurodivergence shaped Kate’s entry into photography and her pursuit of mindfulness through image-making.
• Explore the intersection of activism and artistic ethics through her documentation of the Keystone XL pipeline and Standing Rock protests.
• Learn how a transition from traditional documentary led Kate to create more introspective, poetic works involving geology, animacy, and memory.
• Understand her personal connection to land, and why questions of “home” and “belonging” are central to her creative inquiry.

EPISODE LINKS:

Kate’s Website: www.kateschneider.net
Kate’s Instagram: @kateschneider

OUTLINE:

0:00 – Coming Up…

2:18 – Welcome and Personal Roots

6:48 – Photography as Neurodivergent Expression

12:45 – Education and Early Influences

18:33 – Art vs. Journalism Identity Struggles

26:49 – Land, Identity, and Emotional Geography

34:18 – Conceptual Foundations and Motivations

43:10 – Pipeline Resistance: We, the Heartland

49:49 – Protest Camps and Landscapes of Resistance

57:00 – Existential Crisis and Activist Ethics

1:09:27 – Visualizing Home and Temporary Structures

1:18:45 – Post-2017 Artistic Recalibration

1:23:04 – Geology, Objects, and Intimacy

1:32:20 – Photography as Visual Poetics

1:38:18 – Artistic Legacy and Personal Growth

2:02:18 – Closing Reflections and Looking Ahead

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