Can Pictures Assist Save the Earth’s Poles?

Ponant and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) had been featured on Condé Nast Traveler’s Bright Ideas in Travel 2026. Read the total checklist of winners right here.

Each time I’ve visited the Arctic or Antarctica on project—one thing I’ve had the privilege of doing twice this 12 months alone—I’ve been humbled by the expertise of making an attempt to precisely the doc the sheer magnitude and fragility of the Earth’s polar areas. It’s one factor to {photograph} charismatic animals and marine megafauna, however with such huge, open landscapes you usually want a human or animal topic to present the place scale. Most occasions, I’m left feeling like I solely captured the tip of the iceberg, so to talk.

Like most environmental photographers, I nonetheless attempt to, as a result of I consider that the suitable photograph or video could make somebody care about a spot they may by no means go to. It’s an age-old query in conservation, and a poignant one for the poles: areas that many individuals image as empty, distant, and largely irrelevant to their lives. You may be instructed that the Arctic Circle and Antarctica are fragile, sure. You can intellectually grasp their endangered standing, certain. But, nonetheless, chances are you’ll not really feel emotionally related to their plight. That hole between realizing and feeling is strictly what a brand new initiative between the cruise line Ponant and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) is attempting to shut.

Building on a partnership launched in 2025, the 2 organizations unveiled the Polar Ocean Image Collection in May this 12 months: a library of greater than 500 pictures from the Arctic and Antarctic, launched free of charge by means of the Ocean Image Bank. Many of the pictures come from Ponant’s personal Polar Studio crew, supplemented by the work of photographers from world wide. Overall, greater than 200 photographers donated their work for non-commercial, in response to Richard Vevers, who leads the WHOI’s efforts because the director of its Ocean Communication Academy and Room 71.

A flick by means of the Polar Ocean Image Collection reveals an array of icebergs, polar bears, penguins, and countless shades of blue. An picture catches my eye, what we name a “splitshot” in underwater images: a half-submerged iceberg, dwarfing the sailboat beside it. It jogs my memory of the period of polar exploration, that feeling of smallness beside one thing a lot bigger than ourselves. The visible is transportive. I can nearly really feel a shiver down my backbone—of pleasure and surprise and awe.

When I first visited Antarctica with Ponant in 2014, I noticed firsthand how the White Continent is stuffed with life and motion. A fledgling penguin pecked curiously at my lens cap. A seal pup hauled itself over my legs, fully unbothered by my presence. Icebergs that hardly match into the body of my wide-angle lens floated previous. It’s been over a decade since that journey, and I’ve been again to the polar areas a number of occasions since, however that first reminiscence remains to be seared into my thoughts. When I recount the expertise to Vevers, he nods knowingly. “And great photographers can capture that and allow people to see it, even those who aren’t there,” he says.

Though Room 71 seems like one thing out of a sci-fi story, the cryptic title is just a reference to the truth that 71% of the planet is roofed by oceans. It’s the institute’s devoted storytelling and communications unit, with a aim to, as Vevers describes it, “reimagine how we design technology to engage new audiences.” Before WHOI, Vevers spent a decade in advertising before founding The Ocean Agency, an international nonprofit for marine conservation, inspired by an “ocean epiphany.”