Farewell to the sea-ice

The Project

Creation of a collection of twenty illustrations for a group of French Arctic Explorers ‘Les Robinsons des Glaces’ founded by Emmanuel Hussenet - polar guide, arctic specialist, author & editor, to help raise awareness of the disappearance of the polar sea-ice as part of their ‘Farewell to the sea-ice’ programme (2010).

The Polar Adventure

The drawings depict the polar adventures of these Ice Explorers in the Fram Strait area, to the East of Greenland, where the pack ice that has formed over several years in the Glacial Arctic Ocean is evacuated.

The adventure consisted of getting on a slab of pack ice and drifting on it for as long as possible from the Eastern coast of Greenland. The expedition didn’t require any motorisation of any kind and only sea kayaks were used for getting about, making it possible to move among the ice.

Why this Adventure?

In order to draw everyone's attention to the fate of the ice and to testify to its amazing beauty. In order to associate adventure with poetry and to give the world a new and unfortunately final look at a legendary natural environment.

This adventure highlights the fragility of man in an environment that is extraordinarily powerful and subject to unforeseeable forces. In a few years' time, there will be no ice slab thick enough to allow such a drift to take place. It is a question of celebrating this fascinating natural environment by approaching it with simplicity and a certain degree of poetry - without using fossil fuel and accepting the risks inherent in such an odyssey.

“Climate warming is not just something that involves scientists. It concerns us all, because each of us contributes to and suffers from all of its effects.” ~ Emmanuel Hussenet

Artistic Direction

The drawings highlight key moments of the polar adventure, focusing on the human aspect of this epic journey in the Arctic. The illustrations are done on a soft pink coloured paper to emphasize the passion of these adventurers for this region of the world and their poetic outlook. The objective was to create a video to introduce the expedition with the drawings fading out onto the actual images of the odyssey including a text from Emmanuel Hussenet ‘The Voice of the Icecap’ written like the last will of the Ice.