Kamila Gliwa

Jennifer Fergesen • 18th September 2025

Editor's Letter

Certain images are inevitable in media about Svalbard. Glaciers calve into yawning fjords; permafrost sinks and heaves; northern lights scintillate in the dark sky.

Kirsty Banks

Marian Hansø • 18th September 2025

vente på bussen

-Jeg venter på bussen
sa treåringen,
stilte seg i veikanten
Og ventet.

Rosendo Li

Suzanne Lapstun • 23rd September 2025

Longyearbyen, Pilgrimage

Rorschach or Matisse
might have sewn the pleated drapes of this plateau
its neatly delineated blotches of snow
its minute circuses of stone

Kelsey Camacho • 23rd September 2025

To the Pole

I remember a story. I remember that somewhere on that island is a love letter that has been missing, undelivered, for 126 years—dropped by someone else who was coasting on the wind.

Kanerva Karpo

Elizabeth Bourne • 23rd September 2025

Ice Bound

Gerd stood on deck, a cold wind blowing her hair. She pulled on a knitted cap, then took the wrinkled advertisement from her pocket. "Good wages for adventurous men and boys."

Anna Dobrowolski

Leszek Nord • 23rd September 2025

Mucha, Zdjęcie, Poranek

nie wiem skąd tu jest
na tej wyspie jest taka jedyna
może przypłynęła z paczką drewna
właśnie nim napaliłem

Kirsty Banks

Cally O'Brien • 23rd September 2025

Longyearbyen Interim

Stars peering around clouds that we’d call cotton, if cotton belonged here; we’d say wool, if sheep belonged here; so call them vapor, absent room for lies.

Huet Maréchal

Nastja Säde Rönkkö • 21st September 2025

how to skin a polar bear

First, to find a polar bear you have to travel North of Lapland, across the open seas and onto the ice highways, past the winter wonderland, winter Disneyland, past the closed shipping lanes and cancelled railway plans. Drive your snowmobile with care, carry your rifle with you and keep driving.

Endre Kvangraven

Endre Kvangraven • 21st September 2025

Goose Roost

It’s just after two in the morning, the twentieth of September, and we’re on our way to Hotellneset to see the barnacle geese at their communal roost in the bird lagoon.

Terhi Nieminen

Terhi Nieminen • 21st September 2025

( )

To verify if the deer you shot is dead, touch her eye. Soft skin, nerve endings stroke her cornea, external, half intestine and fear of a fast reflex [one millionth of one billionth of a second; US national debt $36 million millions; Norwegian oil fund value 19 billion kroner (real 2025)].

Door Gerrit de Veer

Paula Sankelo • 21st September 2025

Third time’s the charm

You brought back home to Amsterdam
a polar bear skin
teeth hacked off a living walrus
a god robbed from a Nenets temple

Kirsty Banks

Annakaisa Suni • 21st September 2025

Ett hem är något man måste förtjäna

Mittemellan ljuset och mörkret
besöker jag mitt gamla liv
vill se om en version av mig
bor kvar i norr, om det går
att ta flygplan till det förflutna

Risa Horowitz

Risa Horowitz • 21st September 2025

Sketch for a series addressing the Arctic imaginary of being alone-ness

A fellow artist admonished me for capturing her on camera during a 2017 residency in Svalbard aboard the tall ship Antigua. On a Zodiac cruise one morning in yet another stunning fjord, with my camera already recording, I saw her gently reach over the side of the boat, pick up a small piece of brash ice, and bring it into her mouth.

Marieke ten Berge

Tom Warner • 21st September 2025

Long Weight

No dusk or dawn, no day, no time—
just a dimm'd glow glaring out,
window-powder flickerfrozen,
constant hum, forever. Always was.

Fieke Rader • 23rd September 2025

The Pristine Arctic

The food deliverer cycled around in Ny-Ålesund while a group of tourists admired the Amundsen statue. One of the tourists asked, “Can we order a pizza?”

Lena von Goedeke

Lena von Goedeke • 21st September 2025

The three seconds seat

I find myself in a state of profound boredom of the best kind. I linger, driving through the all-encompassing, dizzying white at 70 km/h for who knows how long. Time seems to seep through the pores between floating ice crystals, suddenly tangible as it no longer passes.

Kirsty Banks

Ellen de Bruin • 19th September 2025

Onder het ijs

She watches the rays of the sun that are bleaching and toning the tops of the grey mountains to a shiny blond. It’s the only thing happening right now: honey-coloured grazing light, rendering those old mountain tops gorgeously glossy. That’s all.

Mark Gee and Poppy Bourke • 19th September 2025

battery-powered misshapen identity | batteridrevet uheldig identitet

one step | ett skritt
with you | med deg
is | er
worth all the | verdt alle de
others I | andre jeg

Marieke Ten Berge

Alexander Lumans • 19th September 2025

When Acting as a Wave

One of the icebergs resembles an electron. Another is a map. An unfolded and blank map. One blank canvas. The possible shapes, all directioning. A side-continent’s constellated array. See: light on a pool of light. A bear’s blue tongue.

Jos Zwarts

Kjersti Ericsson • 19th September 2025

Alkekongeriket

Havhest. Stormfugl.
Bare vingespenn
rundt et lite barometerhjerte
og en hjerne mindre
enn en rypelort

Ruth Stewart

Unknown • 18th September 2025

Fangstmanns blues

fat fox i Foxdalen
fanga minst førti, femti flokker fugl
frista ikke med tørrfisk i fella da, nei
fox faller ikke for fangstmannsfanteri

Tamara Enz

Tamara Enz • 19th September 2025

(un)frozen: THE THREE STATES THAT MATTER

At the north end of North America, where the Arctic Ocean meets the Alaskan tundra, lies an island 4 miles long, 30 meters wide, and 3 meters at the highest point. Hapless seabirds called black guillemots colonized the island 50 years ago.

Esther Harrison

Esther Harrison • 18th September 2025

Antigua’s Final Journey

antigua's last journey,
cold, clear ice—time's frozen breath,
it hurts so good, still.

Aurora Polaris. Australasian Antarctic Expedition (1911-1914).

Oriane Laromiguière • 18th September 2025

The Polar Bug

Banquise.
On dit qu’elle fond.
A-t-on perdu la raison ?
Ses larmes sont douces.
Quand en silence elle souffre.

Jennifer Fergesen

Editor’s Letter

Eugenio Pini

Esterno Notte

Leszek Nord

Białe, Czas, Las, Ślad

Annakaisa Suni

Var det liv

Paula Sankelo

A glacier is drawn

Franziska Hasenburg, Mary Edwards

Everywhere we are now is the farthest place

Eirik Bø

Stille vær så snill

Elizabeth Bourne

Break-Up

Tamara Enz

This is not a drill

FSG

Svaltupie

Alyse Dietel

Precious, Polar Ice, Polar Flight

Majo Kurki

Medusae

Sergei Chernikov

Spits Peaks

Bendik Vasstein Carlsen

det som er til

avstandar i natta

Anita Horowska

Photographs

Giuseppe Gavazza

Frozen Dreams