'The beauty of friendship is that no matter where we find ourselves on this planet, no matter what time of year it is, no matter what has been happening in our lives individually, we can always manage to start again where we have left off'
'The first day of our adventure was a combination of complete exhaustion, driving non stop from Denmark, up through Sweden and across Norway to trek through rain soaked marshland. Whilst finding a campsite for the night, we snuck into an unattended cabin to take shelter from the rain and dry our gear.'
'Each moment was a mental and physical battle with ourselves, soldering on to reach our scheduled check point to set up camp for the night. We were so far north that the sun never set, it would hover around the horizon between 2am and 4am, then rise to salute the land for another 22 hours.'
'We were slightly under prepared. It was supposed to be a wonderful Norwegian summer, but we were soon to learn that the previous winter was the most snow Norway had encountered in over 40 years.'
'As we crossed the summit of the unexpectedly snowy mountain range, we were met with the north face head on. The record snows had completely concealed our path and we were left with nothing but surface patches of terrain to navigate our descent. About a third of the way through, Alex fell straight through the ice while stepping off into the snow, his legs left hanging through the ice into nothingness.'
'After this, the mood changed to an extremely eery affair and we realised we were all in a fair bit of trouble. The next few hours were spent tracking a path by poking the snow in front of us and hoping it wouldn't fall through. Step by step we travelled, back tracking and replanning, through the creaking and melting ice, until we reached the base.'
'It's amazing what can happen when you embark on an adventure completely off the grid with nothing but food, tents, sleeping bags, a few change of clothes and camera equipment on your back. you begin to understand that we, as humans, don't need much at all to have a positive experience.'
This body of work was later exhibited as a solo show under the title of Nørge. It was accompanied by a limited edition deluxe zine release, t-shirt and stationery designed by my lovely wife Chi Borrello. Images were printed at large scale on Ilford fine art rag by FoxLab Fine Art. The show launched in October 2017 to large local and national accolades.
