Cathedrals to Cod

Cathedrals To Cod, as written by Vanessa Kauffman Zimmerly.

Cathedrals to cod. This is how photographer Christopher Wilson describes the A-frame structures dotting the coastlines of Norway’s Lofoten Islands. Wilson spent a few weeks in these most northern reaches of the world (the islands are above the Arctic Circle) last spring; he and fellow photographer Mark Katzman were there to photograph the tongue-cutters, or tungeskjærerne—Norwegian children who follow the centuries-long tradition of cutting out cod tongue to sell as a delicacy.

Christopher did shoot the tongue-cutter portraits—and we can’t wait to see them—but he also spent considerable time wandering through the stark and immense landscape, letting his eye lead and his medium-format camera set the pace. His choice of camera restricts him from moving quickly. “It’s not an action camera,” he says. “It’s impossible to shoot off the cuff.” The restraint is lucrative; the photographs he came away with are slow intonations of winter’s hymn.

While these photographs are almost entirely devoid of humans, the evidence of their presence is abundant. The fishing industry is the industry in the region, and current-day techniques don’t stray far from those of the residents’ Viking ancestors. Wilson reveals the traces of those who live perched at the tip of the world: fishing boats, gabled homes and barns, a lone Nordic skier, and of course, Christopher’s so-named cathedrals where thousands upon thousands of cod hang from the rafters to dry. The eye is drawn to these figures because they stand in such vivid contrast to the natural elements they are shrouded within. The horizon line remains constant and centered in each shot, but everything above and below it is nonlinear—jagged, wild, and unquestionably beautiful.

Christopher talks about the light in Norway in angles—as in, the angle the sun rises above the horizon at different times of the year. “When we were there last March, the sun was at about twenty or twenty-five degrees at its height. It felt like dawn all day.” The feeling of a perpetual dawn is perhaps the series’ central subject. It’s nearly impossible to think about this part of the world without thinking about the rapid changes our planet is enduring. Here is a place of overwhelming extremes, where ancient traditions struggle to be sustained despite contemporary constraints.

In this way, the carefully composed handful of images in Christopher’s series are a gesture of respect. A treading lightly. “If I can come away from a trip like that with maybe half-a-dozen images that I love and feel can stand the test of time, then I feel good,” he says. “I just wanted it to be a quiet adventure.”