Carol Sawyer is Vancouver-based contemporary visual artist who works with photography, installation, video, and improvised music. Her work often addresses memory and the construction of history. Sawyer earned an Honours Diploma in Photography from Emily Carr University of Art and Design in 1982 and an Interdisciplinary Master of Fine Arts (Visual Art, Music, Theatre) from Simon Fraser University in 1998. Sawyer has served as a board member for the Canadian Photographic Portfolio Society, Or Gallery, and the Western Front, and has taught as a sessional instructor at Emily Carr University of Art and Design and Simon Fraser University's School for the Contemporary Arts. Sawyer has received numerous BC Arts Council and Canada Council grants and has been an artist-in-residence at the Western Front and the Banff Centre for the Arts. In 2018 Canada Council for the Arts awarded Sawyer the prestigious Duke and Duchess of York Prize in Photography. Her work is included in the collections of the Canada Council Art Bank (Ottawa), the City of Vancouver, Microsoft Corporation (Seattle) and the Museum of Fine Arts (Houston).