The Awe of the Arctic

The hardcover book The Awe of the Arctic: A Visual History, shown against a white background. The cover features a vintage illustration of explorers in a vast, icy landscape. A group of men are climbing a snowy slope near dark, choppy water, while one man stands alone on a high peak looking out.

A close-up, angled photograph of the cover of the book The Awe of the Arctic: A Visual History. The title is embossed in a reflective, light-blue foil against a textured, sandy brown background. The cover features a vintage illustration of a person standing on a rocky cliff overlooking a snowy mountain range.

The back cover of a book, photographed vertically against a white background. The left third of the cover is a cream-colored panel with black text, including a summary, an ISBN, and a barcode. The right two-thirds feature a vintage-style painting of a dramatic, craggy cliff face with patches of snow, set against a muted sky filled with a flock of flying birds.

A hardcover book titled The Awe of the Arctic: A Visual History, presented at an angle on a white background. The cover features a vintage-style painting of explorers climbing a steep, snowy mountain, pulling a boat up the rocky incline.

An overhead photograph of an open book. Pages 72 and 73 feature three foldout aquatint illustrations by Baron Ferdinand Petrovich Wrangel from 1827. The vintage prints depict stylized arctic landscapes with jagged icebergs and dark, icy water in shades of grey and blue, pasted onto the modern white pages of the book.

An overhead shot of an open book. The left page is titled Feeble and Heroic: Encountering the Fantastical Arctic Landscape and features a large black-and-white illustration of a ship among icebergs. The right page displays text alongside a color painting of the Aurora Borealis glowing above a dark, frozen landscape.

An open book showing a two-page spread with text and color photographs about life in the Arctic. The left page shows a snowy landscape with blood on the ice. The right page has two photos: a person in a boat on icy water, and a blue house with an animal hide and meat drying on the porch.

The book cover for The Awe of the Arctic: A Visual History. The title is in large, silver, stylized font over an illustration of a lone explorer in historical clothing standing on a rocky peak, looking out at a vast, desolate landscape under a grey sky with birds.

A two-page spread from a book. The left page features a dramatic black-and-white photograph of tall, jagged rock formations overlooking a vast, frozen sea with patterns of ice. The right page shows the Table of Contents, listing chapters and essays on the theme of the Arctic.

An open book showing pages 24 and 25, which feature text and historical illustrations. The left page has a large 16th-century woodcut of three Inuit people on a shore, along with two watercolor portraits of an Inuit man and woman in parkas. The right page shows an engraving of an Inuit family, a kayaker, a narwhal, and a walrus, labeled Sauvages Groenlendois.

A composite image showing a book spread with three 19th-century fold-out illustrations of arctic landscapes by Baron Ferdinand Wrangel. The large top illustration depicts a jagged iceberg in an icy sea. The bottom left illustration shows a layered, pyramidal ice formation. The bottom right illustration is a long panoramic view of various ice formations along a shoreline. The artwork is created in muted shades of grey and pale blue.

An open book spread displays 19th-century illustrations. On the left, a large sailing ship is trapped in ice on a snowy, starry night. On the right, a single page contains two images: the top shows a sun setting over a calm fjord between cliffs, and the bottom shows a figure in a deep, snow-covered mountain canyon.

A 19th-century chromolithograph depicting a vast, frozen arctic landscape under a warm, orange-brown sky. From a snowy, rocky hill in the foreground, two small figures look out across an immense expanse of sea ice toward distant, rugged mountains on the horizon.

A two-page book spread titled Feeble and Heroic: Encountering the Fantastical Arctic Landscape. The left page has a black-and-white etching of explorers looking at a sailing ship among icebergs. The right page contains text and a color painting by Frederic Edwin Church, Aurora Borealis, which depicts vibrant northern lights over a dark, icy sea with a small ship.

A two-page spread from a book displaying text and seven vintage stereoscopic cards with light green borders. The sepia photographs show scenes from a 19th-century polar expedition, featuring sailing ships in icy waters, explorers on ice floes, a rocky coastline, and the deck of a ship.

A two-page book spread titled Above Sea and Ice: By Balloon to the Arctic. The left page contains text and two small photos of balloons. The right page features a large black-and-white historical illustration of three tethered balloons flying over an icy landscape with explorers and dogs on the ground below. The caption reads PROPOSED BALLOON VOYAGE TO THE NORTH POLE.

A two-page spread from a book about life in the Arctic. The left page features a large photo of a bloody, icy shore. The right page has two photos: a person in a parka on an ice floe next to a boat, and below it, a polar bear hide and meat drying on the porch of a blue house.

A two-page spread from a publication with text and three photographs about the Arctic. The images show a submarine surfacing through ice with three figures standing nearby, a group of people in a snowy landscape at night, and an illuminated tent under the aurora borealis.

A two-page spread from an art book featuring stark landscape art. On the left page is a large, framed black-and-white print by Emma Stibbon of a snow-covered mountain under a dark sky. On the right page are three smaller, colored prints by Saul Becker, depicting various arctic scenes including mountains and seascapes in muted tones.

The Awe of the Arctic

A Visual History

€ 54.00

VAT included. Shipping costs will be calculated at checkout

Edited by: Elizabeth Cronin

March 2024, 258 Pages, 170 Photos

Hardcover

257mm x 299mm

ISBN: 978-3-7757-4807-0

HATJE CANTZ VERLAG
Mommsenstr. 27
10629 Berlin
Germany
E-Mail: contact@hatjecantz.de

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Envisioning the past and future of the arctic

For centuries, what lies above the Arctic Circle has been a source of intrigue for those who live below its border. Stories from the ancient Greeks mixed with Norse mythology and reports from early voyages have given rise to lively conceptions of ice-free waters and a fabled people who lived at the top of the world. Expeditions to the Arctic in search of resources and trade routes slowly replaced these legends with more accurate information. Yet even these narrative accounts were filled with details of a foreign world that excited the imagination. Accompanying illustrations seemed to promise verisimilitude, giving shape to the incredible.
Drawing on the rich collections of The New York Public Library, this lavishly illustrated catalogue is a large survey of how the Arctic has been visually depicted, defined, and imagined over the past 500 years, and invites us to consider how this history has shaped our current understanding of the polar North and the peoples for whom it is home. The presentation ranges from 16th-century explorers who attempted to capture the perceived strangeness of a remote region to contemporary artists whose work conveys the human impact on its changing climate and vulnerable landscape.

EXHIBITION
New York Public Library
March 15-July 13, 2024