White Box

Nils Strindberg, the young Swedish photographer who took these photos, participated in the famous “Polarex” expedition led by the engineer Salomon Auguste Andrée in 1897. Departing from Spitzbergen, Norway, Andrée planned to fly over the North Pole in gas balloon to either Russia or Canada, depending on the direction of the wind. Andrée, Strindberg, and a third man, Knut Fraenkel departed on July 11, 1897 with great fanfare, observed by politicians and the national and international press. They never came back.

33 years later, in 1930, an icebreaker landed on Kvitøya, or White Island. Usually inaccessible, constantly surrounded by thick ice and hidden by freezing mist, the island of Kvitøya is legendary among whalers and walrus hunters. As luck would have it, two crewmen stumbled upon the buried remains of the Polarex expedition. They uncovered parts of a boat, tools, utensils, a logbook, human remains, and, finally, a camera and rolls of film still encased in a light-proof box.

The negatives of 240 photos taken by Nils Strindberg could at last be developed after 33 years of frozen slumber. 93 images were salvaged. A sensitive, perceptive man, Nils Strindberg preserves his modesty and dignity as he carefully chooses his compositions even in their growing distress. Andrée probably wanted to document their trek for glory and fame, but looking at the photos, we feel that Strindberg, who must have been conscious of the ineluctable failure of the expedition, exceeds his commission. In a simple, humble, even detached fashion, he deliberately conjures through his images a survival story that would, ultimately, fail to be one.