It has taken me a while to get my diary notes written up and to sort out the hundreds of photographs I have taken while traveling. Most of my drawings and water-colours are now up on the wall in my studio (well those not in sketch books) and I'm struggling with how to make images from it all.
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| A wall of Arctic sketches |
It's so different to painting seas.
Since returning home I've been a bit busy ...had a solo show at Cadogan Contemporary in London, driven up Shetland to give a paper and exhibit a few of the drawings made in Svalbard at the Relate North symposium focusing on the Arctic, all of which fortuitously took place at the Museum in Lerwick (and at which I met some lovely people from Finland), I've flown back to Norway for a few days; then there was Christmas and New Year so off back to Shetland just in time for the wildness of Storm Barbara and Storm Connor to hit us, and I've just been to Amsterdam.... In between all this I've been transcribing all my Arctic trip notes on my laptop, as well as writing an application for another project, and trying to get to the studio and make some work. So please forgive the lateness of my Arctic Blog.
Just to recap.......
Prior to my expedition to Svalbard I spent a year researching the Arctic
and concepts relating to ‘northerness’…..
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| Book cover found in a Svalbard art gallery |
An
inherent spirituality associated with the north can be traced back to the
Greeks, whose paradise-like ultima Thule was said to exist at
the back of the north wind. In medieval
geographies ultima Thule
represents any distant place located beyond the ‘borders of the known world - a bleak, inhospitable terrain of ice,
rock, and volcanoes…. between physical and metaphysical realms’. In Tove Janssons’ Moomintroll books the
Groke represents the negative force of northern winter –
an avator of the frost giants of old Northern mythology, the enemy of the
sociable summer happiness.
Reading accounts of 18th and 19thC expeditions,
attempts to reach the Pole - on foot, with dogs and sledges, on skis, by
airship, by hot air balloon, by plane - failed expeditions to find the
northwest passage with ships stuck in ice for years, slowly crushed and then abandoned,
I was struck by how Arctic history is a legacy of desires - to discover riches,
a stage for personal quests and heroism, the need for national pride. Descriptions of hardships suffered, deaths, attitudes towards the Inuit, the
constant need to name and claim places, were both fascinating and depressing.
Fridtjof Nansen, who successfully traversed the
north-west passage in his polar ship Fram,
wrote in 1911 “nowhere else have we won our way more
slowly, nowhere else has every new step caused so much trouble, so many
privations, and sufferings, and certainly nowhere have the resulting
discoveries promised fewer material advantages”.
There is an old ambiguity about going to such places
to find or lose oneself, but perhaps it is more that the north is a place that
intensifies experiences rather than providing answers or transformations. We
have an idea
of the far north as a limitless, an almost incomprehensible metaphysical space
- of north as moving “always out of reach,” leading “always to a further north,
to an elsewhere.”
So back to Longyearbyen.
I'm told that there was never an indigenous population in Svalbard. Before Mr Longyearbyen established it as a coalmining town in
early 20thC, this was a place where trappers arrived and left bearing furs, and
whalers came to plunder and ultimately exhaust its waters.
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| Mist
drifting over the tops of the dark mountains that close in around the town |
At the top of town the road stops and a track leads out and into a wilderness of snow and
receding mountains – and where we are strictly instructed not to go unless
accompanied by an armed guide – there are bears out there. But it looks so
tempting…
Going the other way, the road follows the sea
to the airport, passing the soon-to-be closed modern coalmine with heaps of
prime coal still lying beside the road, and up above the town to the Svalbard Global
Seed Vault. This wedge of steel cuts deep into the mountain, into the permafrost so temperature is constant. Inside is the world's largest collection of crop diversity seeds; a fail-safe bank built to stand natural or man-made disasters. If you want to take a look inside follow this link:
Standing on one bleak shore with the late
afternoon light already starting to fade, geese and sea gulls fly before me as
I walk along the edge of the sea gazing across at the mass of monochromatic snow-covered
mountain range ringing the town.
There’s
a film shoot session in progress, a band hovers around a campfire. The
backdrop is pretty stupendous; let’s hope their music is.
Monday
3/10/2016 78°13.7´N, 015°36.3´E
Sunrise 08:50 - Sunset 18:39;
O°C,
wind 12m/sec
Embarkation day
Looking out of the hostel in the morning and the world looks wonderful, dark muddy land transformed by a covering of powdery snow.I wander up the road and watch snow making its way across the mountains until the view is obliterated.
Time to return to the hostel to catch the bus to the harbour and find the Antigua.
Tumbling from the bus
dragging our luggage through the snow, we gather in front of the Antigua – home
for the next two weeks.
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| embarkation |
It’s all ropes and sails and masts. Crossing the
gangplank snow falls faster and faster, obliterating the far shore. Leaving
suitcases and bags piled on deck disappearing beneath a covering of snow we
investigate our cabins. As I anticipated there is not much room but I am still
shocked at the lack of space – two bunks and one tiny porthole – no room to
swing a cat, let alone store wet paintings, and it’s stiflingly hot. Hey-ho, most
of my time will be spent on deck; maybe I could sleep there as well.
The ship
sets out to sea, and most of us are out on deck following what we can still see
of the coastline through the swirling snow.
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| View from boat as we leave Longyearbyen |
The plan is to sail to Ymerbukta.
It stops snowing during
the afternoon and the light
is spectacular against the backdrop of jagged mountains - white against white,
traces of luminous blue now pink slowly fading as we head out into a sea that is
becoming increasingly rough. Glad I’ve taken my seasick pills.
Sea birds follow
swooping between wave and sky. Standing on deck has its rewards as a group of
white-beaked dolphins join us, coursing through the waves, dipping and diving
in front of the boat. Not usual visitors to this area, they’re an indication of
warming seas since they must only be here because there’s food about.
A less than enthusiastic response by some greets the sound of the ship’s
dinner bell, the heavy sea having already taken its toll. A couple of bowls of
creamy coconut pudding seems to calm stomachs, and We help put the sails up and once sails are raised it
feels less turbulent. Later, out on deck, I stand in the dark watching white
sails buffeting in the wind. The pole star is almost directly above us. I try
to remember where stars are when I’m back home; there’s the Plough and Orion’s
Belt, but then I’m lost in an increasingly clearing star-filled sky. We are
rewarded by a display of northern lights, long tendrils of white light snake
downwards, a green glow pulsating on the horizon. All this and only our first
night at sea. I wander around the deck pressing my ear against the ropes. They
make interesting sounds, vibrating against the tension of wind-filled sails, a
bit like listening to dub beat.
Mid evening, the boat makes
a 180° turn, changing course and sailing north -east. It’s been a rough start.
Later we anchor at Bjonahamna 78°23,6'N, 016°51,6'E.
Tuesday 4/10/2016 Bjonahamna
-2°C, 7m/s wind, Sunrise 08:58 – Sunset
18:31
I stand out on the deck watching the morning light slowly brightening and playing across the mountains - it's a pretty overwhelming landscape.
A morning landing - our first stop (and the day I should have taken the kite). We stand on deck waiting, life jackets
on, a briefing on how to get into and behave in a Zodiac. I can’t feel any
wind, the sea’s completely calm, so leaving my kite on deck and clutching
snow-boots, rucksack full of paper, charcoal, pastels, camera slung round my neck
(have I remembered everything?) I
climb into a Zodiac and we head for shore.
Landing on a beach, a big bank of white pristine snow deep enough to
sink into up to my thighs confronts us. I clamber onto a flat plateau and walk
around slightly dazed; shining sun, blue sky, silence, white clad mountains
with ridges of dark rock surround us.
The group fans out, I feel in shock, scale and distance confound the eye, completely dwarfed by the land. Walls of rock towers above me rising up into the sky like castle battlements. Close up it is as though I'm looking at an abstract painting.
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| Wall of rock and snow |
Where to start? I walk to the end of
the spit of land, sit in the snow and draw, concentrating on dark areas of the
mountains. The light is strange, sun hanging low in the sky - almost as though it's late afternoon and not morning. I'm having difficulty knowing what time it is since not only are we now an hour forward of UK time, we are also another hour forward - 'boat time' - so we can make use of as much daylight as there is, and there will be less each day.
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| snow ridge between land and sea |
Then I suddenly realise that there’s a wind – maybe strong enough to fly the
kite. And this large flat area would be perfect… But the kite’s on the boat and
frustratingly there’s now not time to get taken back to collect it. I reason
there will be other occasions, so back to drawing. I rub snow into the paper,
blending pastel and charcoal; still wet when I walk back along the shoreline and clamber
into the Zodiac carefully balancing bits of paper.
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| charcoal, chalk and snow on paper |
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Later in my notes I write ‘
‘Still can’t work out how to draw this
landscape..’ . What I am thinking? It’s only the first day!
Early afternoon, anchor up, we sail from Bjonahamna arriving at Tunabreen
78°23,1'N,
017°23,7'E and there’s my first glacier, a vast mass of turquoise
ice against burnt umber rocks, luminous pale blue sea reflecting a bright blue
sky and dark mountains.
The Antigua moves slowly into the bay, nosing its way through through a sea of floating glacial ice; this is unchartered water - where glacier used to be. The second mate climbs out along the bow to the front, leaning out to
radio back to Bridge our progress as we approach the shore. Ahead in shallow
water a small pod of white Beluga whales silently surfaces and dips, gently blowing
water as they pass. We stand quietly watching their progress. We stop directly in front of the glacier. It is so blue I can't quite believe it, so massive.
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| Tunabreen |
A low rumbling seems to come from all around me, then a
deep loud cracking sound and suddenly hugh lumps of ice detach themselves and fall,
sliding vertically almost in slow motion, crashing into the sea; the glacier is
calving. It is a terrible yet fascinating sight. Silence, a strange calm, and then
the sea responds, wave after wave roll onto the shore, the boat rocks. This is an
event that is to be repeated over and over during our stay.
We are going to land on a
newly revealed island – now named ´Jægerøya´ - land once connected to glacier
Tunabreen before it retreated. I know that
no continents are static - seismic/tectonic activity see to that - but these
movements mostly take eons. Yet the far north moves around all the time,
visibly, every time the ice grows and melts – you can see it moving - which
means it exists beyond accurate cartography.
Travelling
to shore is delayed while the glacier calves again and we wait for the water to
calm. Finally we are on land, rock and ice beneath our feet; so close to the
glacier that I can’t speak. A vast cliff of ice rising above me, terrifying and
magnificent. I walk, breathing in cold clear air, sound muted, compressed. We
move slowly trying to get our bearings, small smudges against a vast monochromatic
backdrop
It’s weird finally being so close to a glacier;
I have imagined them but had no real idea what they actually looked like and
what it would feel like to be standing in front of one. It’s emotional, and
when, inexplicably since there shouldn’t be a signal out here, my mobile phone
rings and it’s my partner, I cry and try to describe to him what I am looking
at; the vast cliff of ice rising up in front of me, not clean nor smooth and white
as I’d imagined, like a sort of ice rink to slip and slide and ride on. Instead
the surface is rugged, pitted with peaks and troughs, marbled with veins of browns
and blues running through the ice. Thick
ice radiates an ethereal blue color difficult to describe, hovering between turquoises
with hints of cobalt.
Blue because
glacial ice becomes so dense over years of compression, squeezing, forcing out
the tiny air pockets between crystals. Extremely dense ice absorbs a small
amount of red light, leaving a bluish tint in reflected light. So blue is a
sign of old age - ice formed
thousands of years ago. I crouch down and look at the bottom of
the ice, remnants from the last Ice Age,
and I think about the hundreds, even thousands of years locked away inside, suspended
in tiny air bubbles. I think about how many years that snow has fallen,
compressing into this enormous thick ice mass that is slowly flowing down the
mountain valley, the sheer weight pulling with it the debris of earth and rock
with it, sliding relentlessly to the sea.
Walking
around ice lying on the shore, I hear the popping of air bubbles releasing
age-old air into the atmosphere; it’s as though it’s breathing out. Peering
into clear white ice, wonderful patterns of masses of tiny air bubbles lie
trapped inside.
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| frozen air |
Eventually
I sit on the ground and try to recreate colours I see, mixing ice and snow with
watercolour. So much to look at perhaps it’s still too soon to even try paint.
Blue and brown watercolour, bits of ice float together moving across the page.
Too ephemeral to carry back to the boat, I photograph the images allowing paint
to merge, flow across the paper and disappear.
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| ice and watercolours |
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| ice, watercolours and earth |
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| dissolving |
Usually
alone in my studio or out on a coastline drawing and painting, it feels strange working with other
artists around me but also companionable; everyone’s
involved in doing their own thing, alone in their internal worlds and at the same time there’s
an unacknowledged shared intention, we’re all responding to the same place.
Later we trek around the glacier walking close to the vast mass of ice glistening around us, whites, turquoises, streaked dark black and brown like marble. A strange landscape.
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| The Antigua awaiting our return |
Then it's back to the shore to await the zodiacs and return to the ship
