'Ivory brigade, Nunavut, Canada, 2006' by Paul Nicklen
As his latest book Reverence is published, the renowned wildlife photographer and film-maker Paul Nicklen remembers a particularly challenging shoot in Arctic Canada.
“It took me five years of going up to Nunavut every year and living on the sea ice,” says Nicklen. “Narwhals are so elusive.
“I bought an aeroplane, learned to fly it and shipped it up to the Arctic, then had engine failures and blew up a crankshaft.I bought one of those big parasails they use in Cancun for tourists to be towed behind a boat and got dragged over the sea ice behind a snowmobile, trying to get aerials.
“I ended up falling over 100ft – I was pretty banged up. Two days after that I was lost under the sea ice."
‘Monodon monoceros, Nunavut, Canada, 2006’ by Paul Nicklen
Nicklen continues, “I dove down without a rope and went around one iceberg, another iceberg, another iceberg ... I came back to find my little crack in the ice and it wasn’t there. I got lucky as I went back up, guessing, and found the hole.
“I went back to Nunavut year after year, then, finally, like a Hollywood movie, in the last couple of days of trying, we found thousands of narwhals and spent several hours shooting.
“Then, I fell through the sea ice and dislocated my shoulder on the last day, which ended the shoot early. When people see these images, they don’t realise what goes into them.”
WATCH: The story behind Paul Nicklen's latest book Reverence.
Reverence by Paul Nicklen is published in June 2026 by Hemeria, £95. Read more about Nicklen’s photography and work as co-founder of the charity SeaLegacy in the April-June issue of the RPS Journal.
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