Spitzbergen

Entre 2015 et 2021, Paolo Verzone s’est rendu cinq fois au Spitzberg, île de l’archipel du Svalbard en Arctique. Ses photographies ne rendent pas seulement compte de la puissance archaïque et mystérieuse qui émane de cette terre de glace et de pierre. Au-delà de la majesté des paysages, elles témoignent aussi de la vie des habitants qui s’y organise, en dépit de l’hostilité du territoire, dans une étrange poésie.

Spitsbergen is an Arctic archipelago of elemental power, archaic in its stony and icy reduction, in its dimensions and its absolute silence that leaves one speechless. Its sublimity, which has existed for what feels like an eternity, almost without interaction with our civilisation - that is the magic of the Arctic. 
The photographs by Paolo Verzone, who travelled to Spitsbergen five times for this illustrated book, do not only make the mysterious power of the "Cold Coast" visible, but also its people, permanent residents as well as visiting researchers. Verzone shows life where none is actually possible in winter, adapted to this hostile nature, in pictures full of strange poetry.