German director Florian Fischer, 40, discovered diving at the age of 18, while on a trip in Egypt. Today, he describes diving as his favorite creative playground. « For me, diving is linked to creativity. I like diving but I’m not the typical diver who enjoys just to be there. I need my camera because I always have some visual ideas. » Florian evolved from being a graphic design working in the advertising world to a documentary filmmaker documenting the civil war in Burma to an independent filmmaker. Guided by his creative instincts, Florian co-founded Behind the Mask six years ago in order to shine a light on the beauty of nature and the ocean. « Dealing with conservation with a clear conservation message is important, but we figured out how we could raise awareness differently, » he explains. « Today, we document the beauty of the ocean to bring people want to save it. »

Behind the Mask’s films and stories are loaded with authenticity. Drawing from his experience as a creative mind in a narrow world that didn’t suit him, Florian believes that nothing beats telling true stories with guts. « It’s not about me, it’s not about a production company, it’s more about a community. At the end of the day, we portray authentic feelings. And there is no other way to do it than actually feel these emotions. » Similar to French freediver Guillaume Néry and underwater & wildlife photographer Greg Lecoeur, Florian is surrounded by a global network of creative nature enthusiasts. This community being the masterpiece of his work.

Avoiding compromises, looking for beauty, the collective constantly dives deep in the seven seas. From Azores to California, from Papua New Guinea to Indonesia, across the fjords of Norway or on a recent trip to Antarctica in -1°C water, Behind the Mask managed to combine what all creatives dream of: the perfect balance between a certain kind of creative freedom, a bunch of transparency, lots of passion and a needed touch of insanity.

Tell us more about you and your background..

I’ve always been working as a freelancer in the creative industry, mostly doing websites and graphic design. I studied filmmaking and worked a lot in the advertising industry. At the same time, I was also working for a big advertising agency in the south of Germany as a documentary filmmaker. I worked a lot in Russia (Siberia) and in Central African Republic. Then I spent most of my time working on the issue of the civil war in Burma (Myanmar). I’ve always seen myself more as a documentary filmmaker rather than a scenic filmmaker where you need a lot of people and need to wait a lot of time until something happens. While documenting the horrible genocide in Burma, I realized how difficult it was to raise awareness on something because it’s hard to find the right way to address people, especially when it comes to human rights or conservation. Everyday, people feel already guilty about a lot of things. So it’s difficult to make a difference. After my studies, I worked as a creative director for a company for a year. And I hated it. Then, I had a company with 18 employees for 4 years. It was an online agency where we developed websites. I was in charge of the design and creative part. After that, I did a lot of filmmaking for advertising companies and fashion brands. And I also hated that. The fashion industry is a very bad place for creative people. I decided to use my passion and do it for my own fun.

That’s when you decided to created Behind The Mask?

Yes, it was 6 years ago. I started Behind the Mask with two friends. Nothing serious at the time. We all had our job but thought maybe we could make a few films about diving, and maybe we could go on diving trips for free! That was the whole idea at first. We were 3 guys at the time, a photographer, the other one was a diver, and me as the filmmaker. We first worked with travel agencies and brands. I live in Germany and I know there’s a lot of people living close to the sea and have way more opportunities than we have. So at the beginning I thought it was not something very promising, just something to do on the side. But eventually, 3 years ago, I quitted my job and sold my shares in the company. I didn’t like working as a CEO for the company and preferred to be fair to my partners. So here I am today, working full time for Behind The Mask.

How did you get introduced to the sea, the ocean or the global water element?

Diving is very much connected with the filmmaking. I’ve not been diving without a camera for many years. I like diving but I’m not the typical diver who enjoys just to be there. I need my camera because I always have some visual ideas and I hate when I feel like I miss something I can’t capture. When I don’t have my camera, most of the time I don’t go in the water. For me, diving is linked to creativity. I started diving at the age of 18, more than 20 years ago, on a trip to Egypt with my girlfriend. We had a camera with plastic bags around, this kind of homemade housing. We had to fix it several times because there was water coming in. Slowly, it became a thing! Today, if you look at the diving community, I don’t relate much to it. I have a very specific opinion regarding the diving industry especially in Germany. When I started diving, I thought it was fun. It meant adventure, excitement, being close nature, it was about discovering new things and, at the same time, diving is something you can share with other people. My vision of diving never included any notion of competition. I’ve always enjoyed diving as a creative playground. I see it as a feeling, as a chemistry. Diving is an easy place to collect all the emotions and feelings, it’s also an abundance of stories, people, species, animal and locations. There’s a million things. Diving is the coolest thing on earth. The diving industry in Germany is far behind this vision. So I thought there was a great opportunity to combine all the things unique about diving.

3 years ago when you sold your shares to the company, what was your precise vision of Behind The Mask?

I have been quite lucky since the very beginning. I could have made decisions not based on business only. I don’t have a lot of money on the bank but thanks to my work, I achieved some creative freedom. I can be both creative on one side and be paid on the other. I don’t have to make compromises. Every creative person dreams about doing what they like to do, grow their creativity, and be valued and respected for it. For me, it was clear. I wanted to invest in something bigger. It’s not about me, it’s not about a production company, it’s more about a community. Most of our collective decisions are taken with a strong eye on community, on bringing people together. For example, for most of the projects, we spend 80% of the global budget on the logistics and on paying people. Most of the time, we bring more people than we need on set and during trips, just because we want to have a good time together, and we want to achieve this together. At the end of the day, we portray authentic emotions and feelings. And there is no other way to do it than actually feel these emotions. So it’s been a journey to find people I enjoy working with, who are also flexible and who want to serve that community. We like to make tutorials in order to share experience and knowledge. In the first place, the idea of Behind the Mask was to be very transparent with everything. I always hated it when I saw a picture about a place where somebody obviously tried to make it even more than it actually is, by not telling where it is, or not telling when it is. So I thought it would be pretty cool to give these infos to the viewer. Transparency means we always disclose everything. What we do, how we do and what equipment we use… We show and share everything as we’re not trying to make ourselves super cool or super special. All of that is only possible because of this sense of community. We have enough clients and projects to allow us to do that today.

Tell us more about this community gathered around Behind the mask…

There’s a lot of people who are considered to be a member. There are 4 to 5 core members involved with mostly everything. Hamdan Chowdhuri is from Bengladesh, Canada and Singapore and he is our Good Vibration Manager. He also shoots a little bit underwater. He’s an amazing person, everybody loves him. Timo Dersch is the project manager, doing the office stuff, planning things, posting things and writing comments. He’s from Germany and comes from the diving industry. He’s been an editor for a magazine and also shoots photos. We also have Maika Grützediek , she worked as the editor-in-chief of a magazine and resigned a couple of years ago. She’s more experienced in life than the rest of us. She communicates with potential partners and sponsors, and knows all the advertising clients. She has a very good standing in the watch industry for example. Dada Li comes from China, she is a freediver and Padi ambassador. She’s also a very successful blogger in China, she helps us in the Chinese market and is also part of our production works. She is definitely a smart brain. We have Marta from Spain, the newest member of our team. Marta won a competition on Facebook to join us on the project. She is now part of the team. Vanessa comes from Germany and is doing all the tutorial videos about underwater images, she does motion graphic. Peter is also a new member and works as a filmmaker. These are people I communicate regularly the most. Everybody is doing his or her own stuff so that it’s a loose network, but when you look at how much we spent time together last year, it’s maybe more than with our own family. Mario Medarevic is in charge of Dive World Canada, he’s been on a project in the Bahamas with us recently. Whenever we have technical issues, we can relate to him. Then, there are a lot of freelance friends, ready to go on a trip whenever it’s possible but they’re not involved in decision making. Greg Lecoeur is one of the photographers we regularly work with. We’ve been to Antarctica in February and March along with Guillaume Néry…

Tell us more about this recent trip to Antarctica with french photographer Greg Lecoeur and freediving champion Guillaume Néry…

It was a project of 3 different personalities. Guillaume Néry is a freediver and more of a creative mind. He’s also a writer and a multitool creative. Greg Lecoeur is an outstanding National Geographic photographer, and I’m a filmmaker. We thought that doing a project together, we could, from different angles, raise interest of the same place. It was also an experiment to do something together and see how we relate to this special place of Antarctica. None of us has ever been there. Guillaume is wiring about it, I’m doing a film about it and Greg made pictures. We’re thinking of doing an exhibition, a book and a multi series-documentary. The trip was more challenging than expected because of the weather and because we didn’t have enough time. So we’re thinking of going back there and doing it again. It was an interesting experience because it worked well with the 3 of us. We became even closer friends. Now, we’re currently releasing a few videos about this trip.

There was an ecological aspect as well, wasn’t it?

We partnered with Parley and took water samples to see whether scientists can find micro plastics in Antarctica, which is an inhabited continent. It would be interesting to see the human influence on such a continent regarding plastic pollution, but we don’t have any result yet. We took 75 different water samples on different locations that scientists will have a closer look on. The samples are still in Ushuaia, Argentina, as we need to figure out how to send the samples to the US-based scientists. Antarctica is an interesting place with a challenging environment. Swimming in -1°C water in a wetsuit was a thing! We learned a lot about ourselves.

Most of Behind the Mask’s projects seem very challenging indeed. What was the idea behind your « Life is an Ocean » project made in collaboration with Boot?

Behind the Mask is the official ambassador of the Boot show, so we work together with the show as an umbrella company to support what we do. We promote the show because we think they’re doing great. Boot is one of our partners. Life is an Ocean is basically a summary of our four last years. It shows the viewer how we feel about what we do. Life is an Ocean relates to all the emotions that you have, you can mirror those emotions in the ocean. It’s a bit of a philosophical narration. We want to inspire people and get them interested in this world they might not know much about. At the same time, we also want to inspire people who are already divers or content creators. At the end of every year, we create a video that sums up our year’s projects and this video campaign is a common platform your can relate to.

In one of these summary videos, you said « We believe that more people should feel the ocean magic so that we can save it. » Is Behind The Mask a way for your to raise awareness of the ocean?

Well, we’re not there yet as we didn’t find the tool we can use to really promote conservation ever more aggressively. For now, the goal is not to point at negative things. We try not to push people to change their life while providing content that people can make this conclusion by themselves. In the beginning, I thought the idea was a bit weak, NGOs would do differently, but I don’t feel confortable doing that. We’re not scientists and we don’t want to end up in the same box as everybody else. Dealing with conservation with a clear conservation message is important, but we figured out how we could raise awareness differently. Today, we document the beauty of the ocean to bring people want to save it. Everybody relates to the beauty of the ocean and we need to protect it. It gives us more satisfaction and confidence and it acts better than we thought.

What do you like the most in your job today?

I have the freedom and capability of bringing together people, and involving different kinds of people. I like to collaborate with creative minds and like to support and assist people in what they want to do. I also try to include this under Behind The Mask. The biggest challenge is to deal with teams and people, and to give people enough room to grow and do their own things. How I envision Behind The mask in the future? I see it as a lot of different things. We’d like to release masterclass tutorials for underwater imaging for free, so people can learn how to technically do it. We’d like to create a community, giving them the possibility to be part of something. Now that we have a lot of dedicated people united under the same philosophy, I personally need to give some things away. The freedom of creating projects not based on how much money it makes is probably what I enjoy most, as well as the trust from collaborators and clients. For example, we never make storyboards. The way we work is very creative and free. We always keep for ourselves the option to change things. When we go somewhere and realize the conditions are bad, we change our plans. We have a deal with our clients: They don’t have to pay anything if they dont like it, and won’t be able to use it. 

Do you have funny stories to tell about projects that didn’t work out well?

We had a few funny catastrophes where things didn’t work out! We had a project for Mercedes, a story about a small girl and sharks in Scotland. We drove there with two cars, it took us 2 days. We had 12 people around. Greg Lecoeur was there, there was all the logistics planned for 2 weeks of shooting on an island. But the weather was so bad that we couldn’t do anything so we needed to rearrange and move everything to the other side of the UK. We reshot the video about the girl with great seals, which, in the end, the client loved very much. But it’s the perfect example of what challenge means! In the end of the day, this is what make the best memories. I enjoy to collaborate with interesting people like Fred Buyle, amazing freediver and underwater photographer. We stayed in his house in Azores for two weeks and became friends. Stuff like that is the coolest. I love to plan new projects and involve creative people.

What are the new projects coming up for Behind the Mask and its team of creatives?

There’re so many different things going on. Next week, we’re going to Italy, we do an interesting collaboration with a glass artist who is shaping glass, statues and objects out of glass and water. Then, we stay a week in Egypt with our community, a group of 24 people, diving all together. We fly to Philippines a week later for a Chinese customer. After that, we stay in Indonesia for 3 weeks. Then we’re heading to cover the Sardines Run, making a film about this great adventure. Then back to Indonesia, Komodo National Park, as part of our community trip. Then, we work with the Tourism Agency of Papua New Guinea. We have a 7 weeks project there. Then, heading to French Polynesia with Guillaume Néry, one in October then in December. We might be in Norway for the orcas. Then, it will be Christmas and we have to prepare the Boat Show. This year, we gonna have a live studio over 9 days, interview people from the image community and broadcast it live on the internet. Then, April 2020, we have a nice project with a group of handicapped divers in the Bahamas. Our schedule is pretty much busy until June 2020!

Learn more about Behind the Mask on their website.

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Working as a deckhand in Alaska since more than two decades, Corey spent seven years aboard a Bering Sea crabbing vessel. Today, he is the captain of a wild sockeye salmon fishing operation based out of an abandoned cannery complex called Graveyard Point.

Earlier last year, renowned photographer and commercial fisherman by trade Corey Arnold  went to the icy archipelago of Svalbard, meeting those people lucky enough to live at 77° N. From March 21 – April 27, 2019, he will present his latest body of work, entitled »Hornsund«, from his arctic expedition in Svalbard, halfway between Norway and the North pole. His solo exhibition will take place at Charles A. Hartman Fine Art in Portland. 

Words by Corey Arnold: »In 2013, I landed by ship at the Polish Polar Station, an outpost maintained by Polish scientists located on the remote Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard in a fjord named Hornsund. At 77˚N latitude, the station is a rare human outpost in the far North, on an island with few year-round inhabitants aside from native polar bears, arctic foxes, and an abundance of tiny reindeer. In early September the sky never grows dark, and I spent long days trekking across chossy valleys and crumbling mountains, exploring the many glaciers that rest and rumble within a 24-hour walk.

Some days I’d join a glaciologist on their mission across vast glacial landscapes to check their field instruments and on other days, I would walk alone hauling a heavy backpack of camera equipment with an old WWII rifle strapped to my back for protection from white bears.«

More infos on Corey Arnold’s website.

Read our interview with Corey Arnold.

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Fun fact. Nantes-born photographer Thomas Lodin doesn’t call the ocean, the ocean. « We call it the sea, it’s always been like this. » Thomas discovered surfing thanks to his brother when he was 16. Before that, he was playing around with his BMX bike, dreaming of becoming a pro and traveling the world. « But since I got my very first surfboard, I never stopped. I quitted my graphic arts school a year before getting my diploma and I moved to Biarritz. It was 5 years ago. »

Today, Thomas belongs to the small network of artists whose work and adventure are great to watch and follow. « In Biarritz, life is a bit different everyday. Beyond the simple fact of checking the forecast, planning some photoshoots or photos just for fun, I spend a lot of time behind my screen, never far from my notebook. Treating the images, planning the next shoots with clients depending on our schedule, developping pictures, sending orders and thinking of future ideas. That’s what my weeks are about. » We sat down with French photographer Thomas Lodin to discuss his art, the process that he uses to make it, his shared love for digital and analog photography, his passion for old surfboards, his trips around the world, collaboration with France-based Oxbow brand, and his coming projects like « Impressions », a printed book project gathering a selection of 150 pictures taken along these past years.

Either in the basque country, in California, Australia or Mexico, Thomas has this peculiar way of capturing the inner spirit of surfing. Inspired by the greatest icons of the 60s, his steady, unflinching passion for surfing remains relatively unchanged since the first time he took a camera. As art aficionados, ocean lovers and design amateurs, that’s what caught our eyes the first time we met. Thomas has a true fascination for images. « I have the same approach with surfing as with photography. I usually spend more time on the aesthetic aspect of a camera than on the technical side. It’s like when choosing a surfboard, » he says. « Most of the time, I opt for cameras that carry an interesting history and unique design. »

Digital or analog? That’s a question we dared asking. Fortunately for us, Thomas didn’t choose. Digital for work, analog for fun. We asked him to go back on this precious selection of 35mm shots displayed in this article. « These last rolls are mostly black and white pictures I took last year in Biarritz and during trips. The black and white rolls allow me to develop them myself cause it’s quite easy to do and I can save a bit money as well. I shot around 25 rolls and developed some in September. But the rolls ended up stating on top of my desk, » he explains. « So once the rain season arrived, I started to develop the 13 rolls left! These rolls represent generally the off moments while on shoots, on trips or just when with friends. Some have been taken during surf sessions in Biarritz, some others in Paris or during Baiona Bestak (Fêtes de Bayonne, France). Most of them were shot in California during my last trip, from Venice to San Onofre and Malibu, including a short visit in Mexico. I also got some pictures from the opening ceremony of the Blue Factory in San Sebastian and there are some views from New York as well while a shoot for Oxbow. » Thomas has been working as a staff photographer for the french brand called Oxbow for the last 3 years. « My mission is to create most of their visual content and bring a little thing to their brand image. That’s why I collaborate a lot with their ambassadors, especially with French surfer Clovis Donizetti. Before every new season, I also organize the collection photoshoots for their catalogue and lookbooks. We tend to head to coastal cities in order to link up clothes to the ocean, and bridge city and surfing. It’s always great to discover interesting places and see how humans adapted and developed their lifestyle ad activities depending on the continents and cultures. »

Thomas remembers his very first travel for the brand. A 10-days surf trip to the French island of Guadeloupe, just a month after signing with them. « We also left to California in 2017 before discovering the rough winter in Oregon. No sun for 9 days. We’ve also been chasing waves in Italy and our last trip was in Sweden in order to shoot the next winter’s collection. A nice discovery in terms of both landscape, culture and lifestyle. » The french photographer shoots with all that passes through his way. « I mainly shot this series (seen in this article) of analog pictures with a Canon AE-1 with a 50mm, as well as with a point-and-shoot Olympus mju camera including a 35mm lent by a friend. I also have a Nikonos II to shoot in the water, famous design coming directly from Cousteau’s mind in the early 60s, then Nikon bought it back. I also recently acquired a Russian camera, called Horizon, panoramic style that I can’t wait to try. I also shoot with a Pentax 6×7, quite massive but amazing. It’s not easy to carry it especially on trip due to its weight and format (120mm). »

Weight and format are no big deal for Thomas as he draws inspiration from surf culture legends like Leroy Grannis who created some of the most memorable images that surfing has ever seen. « I remember the DVDs of the X Games and of « Nuits de la Glisse » (Night of the ride). At that time, as a teenager, surfing made me dream but I missed something. I didn’t look further than that at the time. I was hooked by this freestyle culture of BMX and its hectic aspect created from scratch by this american culture. I read the magazines and looked at those guys touring across the US. At age 13,in my teenager’s bedroom in Nantes, I imagined myself riding my bike and taking pictures of these crazy spots, » he says. « Later, I stumbled upon One California Day, which came out 10 years ago. It was probably my first  introduction to the story of longboarding. I wanted to dig into archives, portraits of unique characters in order to learn more about this historical grace of surfing. I discovered the work of Leroy Grannis, through Ron Stoner, Don James and Leo Hetzel. I’ve been blown away by their work. I remember the beach, the light and unique atmosphere from California and Hawaii, the crazy cars with amazing designs, testimony of a past era. Pictures from Arnaud de Rosnay in France in the 60s are also iconic shots. I like the soul of these shots and films, that’s why I slowly try to go back to these cameras, as well as with my surfboards, they both embody this era. I try to do it my way though. »

His way, that’s what makes Thomas’s work stand out. Recently he worked on a book project entitled Impressions. « Last year, I started to search in my external discs of these past 3 years, ended up with 4000 images that I found potentially interesting to use. Choosing the final selection has been a long and difficult process but I managed to gather 150 pictures, » he explains. « Then, I started the layout listening to some jazz to get inspired. After trying among 30 covers and starting from 300 pages, I finally have a final version. The book will be ready and out next week (mid-March, 2019)! » Biarritz-based Thomas Lodin photographer reminds us the aesthetics appeal of surfing and it feels good. 

More of Thomas Lodin’s work on his website.

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The SAIL IN FESTIVAL embodies the perfect combination between nautical culture and sailing innovation. Created in 2014, the European festival blends the past, present and future of the sailing culture.

Starting on the 7th of March, 2019, the 6th edition of the SAIL IN FESTIVAL will be the occasion to celebrate sailing through a series of 20 screenings made out of stories, adventures and races, as well as 15 conferences with international speakers, 3 art exhibitions and a workshop.

Urtzi Sagarrubay, director of the SAIL IN festival, says: »We’re creating a unique ecosystem able to combine two essential lines; the educational and sociocultural aspect with the festival, and the innovation aspect and economical development with this special day dedicated to professionals (SAIL INN PRO).« 

Many legendary sailors  have shared their stories on the stage of the SAIL IN. Legends like  Sir Robin Knox – Johnston or Loick Peyron, who once said of the SAIL IN: »You feel the whole team’s desire to share their passion with others. It’ something very beautiful, very pure.«

This year is not different. Among the many incredible guests and presenters will be  Jean-Luc Van Den Heede who needs no introduction. Aged 74, recently spent 211 days at sea and became the winner of the Golden Globe race, a solo world tour, without assistance, without stop and without GPS. He will receive the very first price entitled SAIL IN. For this 2019 edition, art remains a central element.

Another of the this years highlights is the photo exhibition by renowned Italian photographer Carlo Borlenghi whose artworks convey the balance between humans, boats and maritime stories.

When we first met the founders at the Blue Factory and heard the story of their festival,  their vision and dreams for the future, we knew we wanted to sail along. It was love at first sight. Now we are proud to announce Panthalassa will be supporting the SAIL IN  as an official collaborator. We will be helping them spread the word through all our channels, and our Plastic Family will be part of the SAIL IN art exhibition  at the BBK space. We warmly invite you to this 4-day event held in Bilbao on the Bay of Biscay, one of the most popular and important maritime cities in Europe. 

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Based in the South-West of France since 2004, French-German artist visual artist Louisa Raddatz’s work is predominantly based on memory: »My personal and individual memories, as well as my family story through which I want to distinguish myself from history,« she says. »Another important feature of my work is about creating imaginary landscapes based on organic materials as aim to sensitize people of environmental protection – pollution, endangered species – and ecology.«

Inspired by nature, halfway between autobiography and fiction, Louisa uses different surprising natural materials such as hair, horse hair, clay, sheep whole and latex. »Latex is an interesting ephemeral material because by time and a long process, latex is getting blacker and blacker«, she explains. For her 2016-Dark flight project, the France-based committed artist shaped plants »trapped and engulfed by latex as marine animals affected by these disasters« in order to reveal the impacts of oil spills on marine ecology.

On the occasion of her art installation »Atlas« part of the global »Vaste Monde« exhibition in Anglet (France) at the Villa Beatrix, we had a chat with the artist. Let’s meet.

Hi Louisa, how did you get introduced to art?

I always knew that I wanted to do something creative, like being an artist. How I played as a child was already different and imaginative. For example when I was six, I created an animal cemetery with my best friend and I had already created graves for my future pets that I never had until now. I didn’t realize it but it was already important for me to work around memories and learn to preserve them. My passion for art has his origins rooted in a family’s cultural inheritance. My father loved collecting things. He was passionate about space and he collected everything he could find in newspapers. I created an installation entitled « Raumzeit – Welt t traum » about his collection and I was brought to interrogate his personal story (through photos of my father) and his history (Cold War). My story works hands in hands with my family’s, so it’s about my own identity as well as my human identity.

Born in Germany, raised in France, what did you dream of as a kid?

I’ve always been a dreamer but with time, every adult loses some part of magic and innocence. When I was a little child I dreamt of becoming an art teacher or working with pottery. I ended becoming an artist and I have already worked with clay, especially with my »Vestiges« (Remains) piece that questions the destruction of coral reefs. Today when I create, I feel like a child who is playing, and I’m returning a bit back to my childhood.

Where do you draw your inspiration from?

When I was a student, I kept a personal diary where I drew one drawing every day, including the date of the day. So by doing so, I could liberate instinctively my feelings and emotions in an obsessional and abstract way.  For a long time, I didn’t see my drawings as an artwork but only as simple sketches and a research tool linked to my imaginary.  I never shared these drawings to anyone. Working with organic materials, I felt these drawings weren’t enough »alive« for me. In 2016, a series of drawings named »Métamorphoses« was born. This set of drawings was finally animated and lively, constantly in transformation, changing, and moving as a »flipbook«. One drawing followed by another one, reproducing a same shape and adding new elements on it. In this way I created an evolution over time.  My goal was to offer infinity to this piece as well as to my work, more globally. Transformation over time lets us think of the artist Roman Opalka who, for decades, has been writing numbers on the walls of a room every day. At first the wall was all white. Today, despite the ink of the writing, the wall is becoming more and more black. I was also inspired by the works of Michel Blazy, which are sentenced to decompose, transform over time in order to reach the eternity of existence.

»Métamorphoses« is actually a set of more than a hundred of drawings, always in progress, unfinished… Step by step, new shapes arise, evoking living systems like the animal world and the plant world. Many of my drawings are inspired by the underwater world. That’s out some strange jellyfishes appeared on my paper. As a result of these drawings, I created a piece called “Méduses cailloux« (Pebble jellyfish) in 2018 (see pictures). This work is a reference to the only living species in this world called »turritopsis dohrnii«. Turritopsis dohrnii, is officially known as the only immortal creature that can live forever. The secret to eternal life, as it turns out, is not just living a really, really long time. It’s all about maturity, or rather, the lack of it. The immortal jellyfish propagates and then, faced with the normal career path of dying, they opt instead to revert to a sexually immature stage. So they don’t die but transforms back into their juvenile polyp state. »Méduses cailloux« are special jellyfishes that have some pearls on their filaments, it can remember mermaid’s tears-plastic pellets. You can find a lot on the beach of Les Landes in France.  

Tell us more about this »obsessive family archaeology«? Why intimacy, relationships and family are such important subjects?

My personal story is not an ordinary story. The family is union, you are linked by blood. My grandparents are gone. When my last grandfather died, it was the end of a big generation and I created »Marche Blanche«, a homage to all the people who unfortunately left us. This work can make us think about the work of Christian Boltanski. I didn’t really know my grandparents. Two of my sisters are touring the United States by bicycle since 2008. They will probably never come back. I didn’t see them since 2008. I realized a photo album entitled »Sisters« and an installation entitled »Sisters on the road« as an attempt to remain connected. These creations are called »atlas« in reference to the work »the Mynomsyne atlas« made by art historian Aby Warburg (1866-1929); a puzzle of »constellations« that created a family inheritance from his intimate space, documents and archives forming a collection.

Your body of work tends to question not only texture but also space and time. The notion of »past« is also an important topic. Tell us more about the importance of the past in your process of creation.

I’m attempting to reconstruct things from the past by fragments of memories. I present an accumulated quantity of memorabilia. It’s my starting point. Keeping it allows mine to return back to the past to be finally able to preserve it for maybe… eternity? In doing so, I rely on tracks, archives and documents. In order to not forget or »lose memory« of the past, I attempt to resuscitate the past by the means of accumulation. I’m connecting the present with the past. In my work, I interrogate material, space and time (past and present). In order to capture the uncatchable, time and space, I use my artworks as my passageway into the past. I create art that has at its core »survival«.

What kind of mediums do you use? Tell us more about your stunning art installation »Atlas« part of the global »Vaste Monde« exhibition in Anglet (France) at the Villa Beatrix. 

I’m using a lot of different mediums. I have already worked with hair, horse hair, sheep whole, and clay, latex as well. When I’m creating installations with organic materials, it is hard for me to stop, I want to do more and more, in an obsessional way (accumulation) because my pieces are like growing things. I’m always working with the same process starting and resting on a “ritual” based on sorting, ranking, assembling, adding, accumulating, invading, repeating, unifying and finally, living. At the Villa Beatrix in Anglet for an exhibition, I presented two of my works: One entitled »L’envol obscur« (Dark flight) and the other one »Sans titre« (Untitled). »L’envol obscur« was created out of plants (vegetal from the forest) and latex. I transformed the original shapes of plants in something different to be able to speak about the ocean and pollution.

Looking at the art installation, we can guess a reference to the issue of oil spills. Is it?

Exactly. »L’envol obscur« (Dark flight) is about oil spills and oil disaster. When I was younger, I saw a lot of oil spills on TV. In my souvenirs, I  remember harmed and killed seabirds in great numbers, destroyed by oil floats. I’m a vegetarian and this has had a big impact on me. For »Dark flight« in 2016 I worked with different plants from the forest and latex. Latex is an interesting ephemeral material because by time, long process, latex is getting blacker and blacker. I added some black acrylic painting into the latex. Here these plants are trapped and engulfed by latex as marine animals affected by these oil floats disasters. It’s all about the impact of oil spills on marine ecology. The ocean is getting more and more polluted today. Nature lost its original beauty. My approach is to talk about pollution in a very aesthetic, poetic and fairy way. A kind of imaginary landscape which lets us dream and question ourselves.

You’ve also been using plastic trash and remains trying to give them a new life. Tell us about this amazing art project.

This project entitled »RVB« (Rouge/Red/Vert/Green/Bleu/blue) was created in 2010. It represents three monumental trash islands in primary colors. For the green one, I have created an outfit of trash so I can animate the trash with my body by doing performances as I did in Bilbao, Spain. The idea is that all the trash gives a new life to a new creature. I was inspired by the seventh continent that is a third of the size of the United States and consists of an accumulation of plastic waste in the oceans. It would cover an area larger than France – nearly 640.000 km2.

In 1997, the American oceanographer Charles Moore discovered the first vortex of waste in the sea: an area of 3.4 million square kilometers contaminated by floating plastic waste, accumulating in the North Pacific gyre, a giant swirling mass of water formed by the ocean currents. Similar pollution can be observed in other gyres in the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. Recently a whale has been found dead with six kilos of plastic in his stomach. My work »Vestiges« (Remains) represents damaged white reef corals realized with clay. Coral reefs are increasingly threatened by coral whitening, caused by the death of unicellular algae that live in symbiosis with coral, resulting in coral death. Coral reefs have survived tens of thousands of year of natural change, but many of them may not able to survive the havoc brought by humankind.

What are your up and coming projects?

Actually, the exhibition »Vaste Monde« is always open for visiting until 9th of March 2019 at Villa Beatrix, Centre d’art contemporain Anglet, France. I invite you to discover »Dark flight«. I will participate in a festival »La magie dans tous ses états« organized by a local association in Jonzac, France. I will show one work at Cloitre des Carmes in Jonzac  from the 10 to the 29th of February. I also have some upcoming projects like another artist residency in Charente Maritime, France.

Discover Louisa Raddatz’s work on her website. 

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Marine biologist, conservationist, freediver and entrepreneur Ocean Ramsey.

What it’s like to lock eyes with a great white as it slowly and directly approaches me is a feeling I’ve been fortunate to experience many times before but how’s the rough toothed dolphin escort too. I can’t say enough about the importance of sharks for healthy marine ecosystems, for the ocean, we need sharks and yet, perhaps because of the negative and inaccurate way they are portrayed in mass media many people do not care that they are being killed at a rate of 70,000,000-100,000,000 every year. What’s worse, they are killed mostly just for shark fin soup or for shark fishing as shark sport fishing. I would encourage you to see the cruelty and waste and compare it to this reality of peaceful and respectful coexistence. I do not encourage people to do this. I’ve been working with sharks for over 15 years, over 30 species including white sharks all around the world. They are apex predators not monsters nor puppies, but this was the gentlest grandma great white shark I’ve ever met. Deepest gratitude for my team and the incredible shot I will cherish forever 

We really need to all be working together. Put the egos aside and let’s work together to help save sharks for the next generation if not for ourselves.

Professional conservation photographer and shark photographer Juan Oliphant.

The first great white shark I ever swam with was in 2005 off my home Haleiwa with a similarly large great white shark who also rocked the boat I was on at the time working with sharks. I guess I am lucky that history repeats and not much has changed. What has changed though is shark populations are severely declining but for the first time ever I’ve seen this huge shift in perception in the last 5 years mostly due to imagery and the work that Ocean Ramsey and the team at One ocean diving and @oneoceandivingprogram and conservation and research division does.

In this shot, Ocean Ramsey is in the right place at the right time. The reality is that this moment took years or even decades to play out this way and I’m going to say it is due karma for Ocean. I spent the last decade trying to keep up her. Ocean is always working late into the night and getting up super early for work, writing papers for permits, shark research, conservation, leading dives, training safety divers, creating non profits, writing to senators and CEOs, doing educational out reach, organizing reef and beach clean ups, creating shark conservation designs and a clothing line all for shark conservation.

Ocean has dedicated her life to sharks and that is the biggest part of why I love her so much. She doesn’t do it for ego or fame, purely for love and hope that people can see that. She actually is a shy person that would rather keep to herself but the only reason she speaks up and gets in front of a camera is for them, the sharks. She learned early on after finishing her marine bio degree that there will be nothing left to study if we don’t speak up for these animals.

I hope my conservation images like this help people to question their perceptions and realize the beauty, and importance of sharks. I also hope that they inspire the kind of compassion and connection we need to have with nature and sharks, to help protect them and coexist along side them. You don’t have to love them but they do need to exist, they are absolutely critical for the health of marine ecosystems which all life relies on. Everyone has a part to play in shark and ocean conservation.

Education is the key. The only sad thing in all of this is to see other conservationist and scientists waste their valuable time attacking other scientists and conservationist. We really need to all be working together. Put the egos aside and let’s work together to help save sharks for the next generation if not for ourselves. Focus on the sharks and save them is what Ocean is about and I wish more people were like her. This amazing photo is not mine. The photo has been taken by @camgrantphotography, also in in the right place at the right time.

Photo: Cam Grant.

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»Swimming with these gentle giants« by photographer Travis Burke.

I held my breath and dove down toward the darkness. Deep below me I could see whale sharks emerging as they made their way near the surface feeding on plankton. As I turned around, I saw this scene with beautiful rays of light casting down through the water from the early morning sun. Peering through the lens, I snapped a couple photos before starting my ascent back to the surface. 

Dive Master and Marine Biologist Brinkley Davies shared her knowledge and passion for these sharks with me during our 15 hours day on the boat. These whale sharks lack natural predators, but in recent years they have been listed as an endangered species due to shark finning, and other anthropogenic pressures such as fishing operations and plastic pollution.

There is so much we still don’t know about these majestic creatures and it would be a shame to lose them forever. Little things like limiting our use of single use plastics, supporting sustainable tourism and saying no to shark fin soup will go a long way in protecting these and so many other animals that have been around for millions of years!

In a place where many people would easily resort to accepting more money to catch, kill and sell these animals fins, these fisherman have chosen to live in harmony with these animals.

 

»In the middle of the ocean far from anywhere« with Marine biologist, freediver and surfer Brinkley Davies

I have worked with whale sharks for the past few years at home in Australia, in both tourism, and research/conservation, on the Ningaloo Reef, a place that leads the way in whale shark tourism. Teaching people about their importance in our ecosystems and their struggle against extinction due to anthropogenic pressures such as overfishing, being targeted for their fins, and falling victim to plastic pollution. Before this trip I hadn’t seen a whale shark anywhere else, and have been intrigued to see how things were run elsewhere.

After steaming for 4 hours, we arrived at a small boat with winged platforms in the middle of the ocean far from anywhere. With very fine nets dropped into the water periodically around the full moon, a fisherman would live out here for a month, in a tiny wooden hut on the boat the size of a normal household toilet, and fish for the month. 

The whale sharks were attracted to the organic matter that was ground up and falling off the platform into the water, they swam around under this set up, filter feeding on whatever was around, and then diving. 

The Indonesians told me about how they call them the “ Star Sharks«. In a place where many people would easily resort to accepting more money to catch, kill and sell these animals fins, these fisherman have chosen to live in harmony with these animals, and let the odd few tourists who come by every once in a while, jump in and swim with them. 

There was around 7 whale sharks when we first jumped in, and we spent about 2 hours in the water with them. I was thrilled to see not one piece of plastic floating by during this time.

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As a true pioneer in his country, Sumer Verma tends to raise awareness of the ocean by showing the beauty of biodiversity. Considered the first underwater photographer and cinematographer in India, Sumer also works as the managing partner at Lacadives India, the country’s first dive centre.

After two decades spent under the surface of our oceans, the 42-years-old photographer dedicates his work to spreading a message to the world and the young generation about the state of our oceans. »Even after almost 20 years of diving and 10,000 dives into the ocean, I’m still totally blown away by the abundance of marine life,« he says before mentioning the dying reefs and the loss of fish diversity. »But the ocean has dramatically changed. The amount of problems is catastrophic now and causes coral damages. Overconsumption, cruelty to animals, shark finning, overfishing for consumption, plastic pollution, pollution based on dumping, global warming… Everything is damaging the ocean. We reached the critical point.«

Lately, Panthalassa had a great talk with India’s best-known underwater and marine life photographer Sumer Verma, evoking a few solutions to global warming as education and making marine life documentaries to sensibilize people to the beauty of the planet.

Hi Sumer, do you remember your very first scuba diving experience?

I was born in Mumbai and after college, back in 1997, I dived for the very first time near Lakshadweep Islands. Before that, I’ve only been swimming. I’ve never done any snorkeling or diving before. Then, on a vacation, I got my scuba diving certification. At age 21, that’s when it all started.

Would you say this transformative trip was the beginning of your passion for the ocean?

I used to live in the city so, until then, I wasn’t exposed to any pristine ocean. Mumbai is situated by the coast and we’ve always loved the ocean, we would even go to Goa on beach vacation, however I never really experienced the sea or nature in its pristine form. In 1997, it was the first time I looked into the sea though an eye mask. When I made the trip to Lakshadweep, I’ve been blown away by its white sandy beaches, crystal clear waters, the turquoise lagoons and pines trees all around. I was not expecting that, I’d never seen something like that before, I was not aware that something like that even existed. At least in India! It was a complete positive chock to see how beautiful this area was. The water looked like glass, you could see 20-30m below when underwater. It was amazing to see how clear and clean the ocean could be.

That’s how you got naturally introduced to cinematography?

From that precise moment, the only thing I had in mind was « I need to live here, I need to do more diving and need to be surrounded by a place like this rather than spend time in the city. » So I took a lot of diving courses. After 50 or 60 dives, I decided to capture my passion through video. At the time, there was no information about underwater photography so it took me a long time to turn myself to photography. I first started video just to capture moving pictures of the ocean, sunsets, turtles and the light.

Photography came after then?

Yes, I slowly realized that being a cinematographer was very difficult, especially with the heavy material. You definitely need a lot of hard discs for example (laughs). And frankly, most of the time, the videos you create are dedicated to Instagram or internet only. So I was collecting a lot of footages but felt there was no way to really use them, or possibly think of a story. I felt it was a very restrictive use. Photography helped me to focus on my work. So, after a few years, I shifted to still cameras and housing. Ten years ago, there wasn’t any underwater photographer in India. Today, I’m glad to see the diving community in India growing a lot. I would say there’re currently 10 digital photographers and housing users in India. There are maybe 100 point-and-shoot camera users doing underwater photography. But at the time, there was nobody doing underwater photography.

Today, you’re considered the first underwater photographer and cinematographer in India. How does it feel?

To be honest, I’m very happy to be able to travel and jump from an assignment to another. Whether it be for music videos or feature films, all my videos are water-related. I have a catalogue of different commercial clients, going from Vogue to surfing publications. Being able to do all theses things is definitely a great feeling because it’s always been a dream to run an independent career.

What do you like the most in your job today?

Being able to work with passion is what I love the most! Although the last ten years have been pretty intense, when I’m underwater with my camera, I really don’t feel like working. It’s pure pleasure, passion and love. Turning the passion into profession and get paid to do what I love is a great feeling for sure!

In a recent interview, you said »What you see on the surface of the ocean is nothing like what’s underneath. It makes you realize just how vast and beautiful it is.« How would you describe the underwater world?

The underwater world is pure magic. Even after almost 20 years of diving and 10,000 dives into the ocean, I’m still totally blown away by the abundance of marine life. There’s so much life down there! The colors of all the fish, the movement of some larger fish like manta rays or sharks are pure magic. You can’t believe it’s real, it’s so beautiful.

You spend most of your time underwater all over the world. Over the years, did you notice a change due to climate change?

To be honest, in 10 years, the ocean has dramatically changed. The ocean is getting totally destroyed. In 1996-1997, there was an important coral bleaching, in 1998, El Nino had a huge impact on coral reef. IN 2010, there was another bleaching and another one in 2015. Global warming is the very first factor. Today, despite the apparent pristine clear water on the islands, 90% of the coral reef is bleached. That’s why the fish population is also going down. The amount of problems is catastrophic now and causes coral damages. Overconsumption, cruelty to animals, shark finning, overfishing for consumption, plastic pollution, pollution based on dumping, global warming… Everything is damaging the ocean. We reached the critical point.

That’s why you an active member of ReefWatch Marine Conservation, an NGO dedicated to protecting damaged coral reefs. Tell us more about your actions.

ReefWatch Marine Conservation is very engaged to educate the youngsters. We try to raise awareness here in India. We’re currently working on a project aimed at pushing consumers to use biodegradable packages. For example, we recently worked closely with restaurants to convince them to use bamboo straws. The movement is on, however you can’t help yourself feeling powerless sometimes because whatever you’re doing, despite your small efforts, the global issue remains huge.

 According to you, what would be the solutions?

We need to raise awareness about the ocean. We’re currently working on a project done through ReefWatch Marine Conservation, in which we encourage more and more sustainable practices in urban areas. Big cities gather millions of people, the problem is real there. We organize beach clean-ups and work on consumption habits with people. We need to make people feel part of it, close to it, and they need to be told what to do. It’s constantly about getting people involved. We work with schools because who can help the world except the next generation? Kids are very positive, open and concerned towards ocean awareness. We keep passing on a message of living in some kind of balance with nature. Individual become very conscious of consumption. We can’t blame other people or blame the government, we need to change our own actions. Recycling and garbage management are an everyday question we need to ask ourselves. We’re part of the problem. So it’s all about educating and inspiring people in a gentle positive way.

Today, you’re one of the most renowned marine life and wildlife photographer with more than 20 years of experience. What are you the most proud of so far?

I started a film project between 98 to 2003. I got a lot of footage in my library and decided to make a film out of it, a project about what’s happening in the area I was based. So we made a film called « Trouble waters » about global warming and its effects in an area so isolated yet so devastated. It reflects what’s going on elsewhere. I won a national award, the best cinematographer and best of the show. It is still a very beautiful moment because the film has been screened in a thousand schools across India, it’s been translated in many languages, and continues to be screened during festivals. Today, there’s not many similar films in India anymore, so still 10 years later, it gives me a lot pride. To me, more than photography, more than articles, films are the most powerful tool that we got to tell stories about the ocean, and show the stack degradation of the ocean.

You’re a managing partner at Lacadives India, the country first dive centre. You’re also currently opening a diving school in The Andaman Islands between India, to the west, and Myanmar. Tell us more about this coming amazing project!

Indeed, I’m proud to be a partner at Lacadives India, the centre where I first got introduced to diving 22 years ago. The season is going to start next week so I’ll spend some time with my instructors there. A number of our clients involve schools programmes who come for snorkeling and scuba dives, walks and talks with marine biologists. We also host a number of internships who come to do photography internships for example. We don’t deal with mass tourists but rather with niche clients as we’re situated in a very isolated spot. So we’re lucky to work with very like minded people. We trained more than 10,000 people so far. Scuba diving is set to become one of the mainstream adventure sports in India.

What are your next projects?

I have more film projects with Bollywood in November and December. The wildlife is very passion-based. For the moment, the opportunities are very small but through the NGO, we’re getting a lot of good feedbacks concerning the ocean. Keep going, keep going!

Follow Sumer Verma’s work on his instagram.

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On Friday the 27th of July, we’ve been happy and proud to launch the Panthalassa Blue Factory into the world. Over the years, Panthalassa, brainchild of creative director Sergio Penzo, became a platform known for bringing together some of the world’s most talented creators. Our main motivation is putting a light on the beauty and fragility of the ocean.  According to Sergio Penzo’s words,»this love for the big blue is what inspires the Panthalassa Society so it was natural to choose San Sebastian, a city that lives from and for the sea, as the place to start this new voyage.«

Thank you very much for coming to join in on the celebrations, we hope you had as much fun as we did. Life is all Ocean.

Photos : Philipp von Buch

Photo Clovis Donizetti: Thomas Lodin

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When I discovered Anita Conti a few years ago, her work instantly blew my mind. I remembered reading everything I could regarding her career as a photographer, explorer and as the first french female oceanographer. In the late 1920s, Anita Conti used to spend months on fishing boats, documenting fishermen’s life along the coast of Saharan Africa, Senegal, Guinea, and off the coast of Newfoundland (Canada).

Earlier this year, when I came across « Le Naufrage », a series of pictures created by Quebec-based photographer Charles-Frédérick Ouellet, I felt the same love at first sight. Both dark, poetic and dramatic, his body of work turned out to be a cry of love to the St. Lawrence River, this «  dominant element of our landscape » that connects the Great Lakes with the Atlantic Ocean. Drawing a parallel between past and present, Charles-Frédérick Ouellet tends to introduce a personal vision into a documentary approach. « Le Naufrage is a photographic investigative journey that has taken me to the hinterland where documentary photography and historical documentation converge. » 

Thus, I wanted to know more about this powerful timeless visual essay turned into a book, published by Les Éditions du Renard, that « has become a space of contemplation that opens dialogue on the representation of place and memory, the natural world, and our living past. »

Hi Charles, tell us a bit about this body of work entitled «Le Naufrage »  started in 2010…

Le Naufrage is a photographic investigative journey that has taken me to the hinterland where documentary photography and historical documentation converge. I have always been fascinated by the St. Lawrence River, which I see as something much more resonant than merely a great seaway dominating our landscape. Le Naufrage is but one part of a larger project in which I explore the iconic river as a unifying force that binds together the traditions that gave birth to and have always shaped Canada society. My work takes inspiration from myriad sources—exploration narratives, sailor’s legends, and the work of the navigators and oceanographers who travel the St. Lawrence—and the book has become a space of contemplation that opens dialogue on the representation of place and memory, the natural world, and our living past.

How would you describe your pictures from Le Naufrage?

First, this title was chosen for its poetic echo. I feel the word itself represents, in perfect balance, the tension between the sublime force of nature and the history of men at sea.

My book presents a personal vision of the St. Lawrence steeped in the river’s cultural heritage and folklore. Ranging from gritty realism to oniric impressionism, the images gathered all bear the impress of the awesome force of the natural world. This body of photographs is supplemented by others taken on land, along the Gaspé and North Shore coastlines, depicting the sites of shipwrecks that bear the invisible scars of the past. This experience didn’t change my perception, but it made me understand the vastitude, the strength of the Saint-Lawrence river as well as it’s vulnerability. Although fishermen are men of few words, they teach you a great deal about humility. 

Fishermen seem to be the heart of your work today. Over the years, what did catch your eyes as a photographer working on boats?

For years, my work has explored the figure of the fisherman as a symbol of our collective origins. Working on fishing boats, exposed to the weather, these men labour in silence. Over time I began to see their world, through their eyes; an elemental environment of coastline, horizon, sea, wind, and sky. As if of their own volition, my photographs taken on the water naturally slip away from the discursive subject to fuse into more abstract seascapes. The Saint-Lawrence river covers a vast area and different realities. Although I photograph fishermen from different provinces as far as Nova-Scotia, I decided to concentrate my project around the estuary of the Saint-Lawrence river. This project aimed to bring together past and present by creating a dialogue between landscape that bear the traces of shipwreck and seascape of daily life at sea. 

In which way is your work a mix between a personal vision and an investigation?

It’s definitely more a personal vision than an investigation. Nonetheless, I tend to start my project as an investigation process. Since this project has taken quite a few years to realize, a lot of things changed since the beginning. At first, the project was meant to be a photoreportage but I knew there was more to show than men working at sea. Most of the things that inspired this project were abstract such as the history of navigation and the weather condition. It become an investigation process when you trying to find a way to represent things that belong to the Hors-Champs. 

As a photographer from Quebec, what’s so special about this river?

I grew up near the Saguenay River in Quebec, Canada. I always felt that coastlines were the perfect place to experience the landscape. I guess I’m interested in waterways because they are engraved in our genes. Not so long ago, the coureurs des bois, who were mostly French-Canadian and mixed blood, were sailing down the river trading European items for furs and exploring the continent. This river has played a major role in the colonization. It’s the main water way to the hinterland of the North American continent. Through the years, most of the Quebec population settled along the coast line of the Saint-Lawrence river. We shall remember, this river is a dominant element of our landscape. Quebec began as, and has remained, a seafaring society, dependent on the St. Lawrence to transport provisions, communicate, and travel. Long before European colonization took root, fishermen from Scandinavia, Basque Country, Spain, Portugal, and Saint-Malo plied their trade along our coast, harvesting the bountiful resources of the St. Lawrence Estuary. 

Tell us more about the 108-pages book you published.

This photobook is also an exploration of the narrative form itself. The physical book is designed to resemble a reference book. Its aesthetic harkens back to classical book design and adopts certain conventions of an earlier time when books were repositories of knowledge and credibility. Key features are marbled end papers, a linear structure, and page layout that recalls early scientific works. This clean design augments the force inherent in the way images unfold in sequential order. 

The content is divided into two parts. Part One, a prologue of sorts, is a series of landscapes depicting the sites of shipwrecks. It serves as a temporal marker, immersing the reader in the past from the moment they open the book. Part Two is the heart of the work: a sequence of forty images of waves, clouds, and fishermen that recalls 19^th Century marine paintings. The images in Part Two are interspersed with a short text by playwright Fabien Cloutier. 

What’s next for you this year?

At the moment, I keep working on identity symbols that inspired North American mythology. For the past few years, I have been following in the footsteps of Louis Jolliet. As the first explorer born in North America, first non-native to map the Mississippi, cartographer, royal hydrographer and coureur des bois, Jolliet is one of the greatest forgotten figures of our history. Other than that, in a couple of months, I will be over in the Basque Country and on the North-shore of Quebec and Labrador taking photographs for a project about the Basque fishermen, who settled in North America before colonization. The project is a collaborative residency between Quebec and France, where I will work with French photographer Christophe Goussard.

Discover more about Charles Frédérick-Ouellet’s work on his website.

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