Although far behind numbers 1 and 2 Los Angeles and New York, Vancouver has arguably emerged as the third most important art city in North America, much of what the city is known for being its photography and what is called Vancouver Photo Conceptualism, the "movement" which emerged in the 1970s. Beyond the reason for Vancouver as an art center, the photo work of the conceptualists is discussed by some of the artists themselves, by art museum curators, and other art historians. They talk about the process behind the work in general and of specific pieces or photo series - that process which may be much more manufactured than what may appear on the surface - the differences between photography as art and other visual art forms such as paintings, the differences between photographs as museum installations and photographs in art/coffee table books, and some of the photographers' other creative endeavors both in the visual art world and beyond (a number of them who, in the 1970s, belonged to a renowned Vancouver indie band called UJ3rks) and the synergy that exists between those endeavors.
—Huggo