Activities in nature

Speleology in Vatnajökull, a glacier covering almost 10 per cent of Iceland’s surface area, with 8,000 km² of ice and up to one kilometre thick. Within its depths, your senses are overwhelmed by intense shades of blue and astonishing ice formations, walls filled with air bubbles and crystalised structures that are over a thousand years old – something which, if you stop to think about it, is truly incredible.

A tiny figure of a photographer takes a moment of rest to admire the wonders inside the Aladár Földvári cave (now closed to the public for safety reasons) at Aggtelek National Park in Hungary.

During cold spells and heavy snowfall, we often head out at night in search of powder snow and untouched slopes where we can carve out turns. These shots are demanding for both riders and photographers, both in terms of the physical effort involved and the creative challenge of lighting the scene and freezing the action in complete darkness.

In this image, I wanted to convey the immensity of the landscape in contrast to the human presence. We waited for the day when the conditions we were looking for came together, and then we set off. The minute the light began to highlight the different layers, I asked Inés to run along that boundary between shadow, mist and emptiness. I wanted to capture the sense of solitude, silence and precision required to make one’s way across this terrain.

Upon seeing the scale of the Verna Cave, I sought to create an image in which the emptiness was the main focus. The geometry of the line follows the water cascading from the ceiling and draws the eye towards the light in the background, whilst the natural mist and the waterfall reveal the true dimensions of the cavern where the Slackline Pays Basque association set the world record for an underground highline.

Skaters on ice breaking up in spring. After some cold days there was created a new layer of ice on the fjord. There was no wind, but the tide was breaking up ice floes. This was a popular occasion for skaters, and several of them approached the open water without fear.

An interplay of lines, light and shadow featuring a group of ski mountaineers in the area around the Brazatos mountain lakes. The skiers’ shadows blend, on a human scale, with the mountain’s own shadows, giving a sense of the scale of our place in nature.