Not Just a Selfie with a Bear: Piotr Madej Films the Arctic
He belongs to the elite of Arctic sailors, combining his passion for film and travel in his endeavours, demanding respect for nature. The Polish sailor and filmmaker Piotr Madej presents the Arctic as you’ve never seen it before.
He has sailed more 200,000 sea miles throughout the past 15 years, traversing seas and oceans around the globe. He’s participated in huge regattas, commanded fast sport yachts and led expeditions involving special units. He was even the captain of superyachts owned by the richest people in the world, but that sort of sailing didn’t light his fire. Instead, he chose a different way – a cooler one.
In the land of ice
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A boat against the background of a glacier, photo: Arctic Yachts
Piotr Madej, who is currently 36 years old, could divide up his nautical experience and share it with many of his older colleagues. For years, he’s belonged to an exclusive group of sailors specialising in exploring the Arctic – traversing the seas of Greenland, the Northwest Passage, Svalbard, Iceland and the Arctic Norwegian waters. It’s to them that he has devoted the past 5 years, dividing his time between the cold waters of the North and Valencia, where he lives when he’s not travelling. In conversation with Culture.pl, he admits:
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Sailing and film are my lifeblood, something that pushed me to undertake new challenges and helps me overcome my limitations.
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It’s hasn’t always been that way. Before he took up sailing professionally, he wanted to be a filmmaker. He even attended film school, but it turned out to be completely useless for him. ‘I didn’t feel like I wanted to spend five years of my life there’ – he recalls. Disappointed with the teachers’ and filmmakers’ anachronistic ways of thinking, he dropped out. He decided to learn from practitioners.
He took up sailing, hoping that perhaps on day he’d be able to combine his two passions – the one for travel and the one for film. Soon afterwards, expeditions became his life, also because of the people he met along the way. They included sportspeople travelling to the northernmost corners of the world, such as divers, skiers, polar explorers. There were also scientists studying life on freezing Arctic lands, as well as artists executing cinematic and photographic projects. Accompanying them in their expeditions helped him discover his own goal.
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It was always important to me to search for meaning in what I do. I didn’t want to sail to the Arctic just so that someone can drink champagne and take a selfie with a polar bear. I needed more than that.
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‘Aquarella’ – the most dangerous film ever
A breakthrough happened in the form of a meeting with Victor Kossakowski, a Russian director of energetically executed documentaries, named ‘the Rembrandt of cinematography’. They met in 2016. Kossakowski, the creator of the globally celebrated documentary ¡Vivan las Antipodas! (Long Live the Antipodes!), was then preparing his most spectacular film, Aquarella, a documentary superproduction whose protagonists are water and ice. The full-length film constitutes a true symphony of the two, full of emotions, danger and beauty.
Piotr Madej was one of the film’s creators – thanks to his sailing experience, he helped to execute Kossakowski’s daring vision. He transported a 13-people crew and two tonnes of equipment on his yacht. ‘It was then that I saw what a giant production of a documentary looks like’, Madej recalls.
It turned out to be a perfect combination for both men. Aquarella was one of the most renowned films of 2018 and one of the most impressive cinematographic-logistic-nautical endeavours. It was no accident that the global media deemed it ‘the most dangerous film ever’. The first two weeks of sailing together on the set of Aquarella in Greenland were the beginning of Madej’s and Kossakowski’s friendship. One year later, they sailed across the Atlantic together. They did it in winter – late February and early March. Together with the film crew, they broke through the storms, trying to capture the ocean’s wild nature.
Their expedition constituted the first-ever attempt by a professional film crew to shoot an enormous ocean storm. Before that, there were attempts to film storms using compact, more microminiaturised equipment by small, often amateur teams. When Madej and Kossakowski asked people from the industry how to organise an expedition like this, it turned out that no one had done anything like it before. For the Pole, Aquarella became a personal source of inspiration.
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It’s a proof that one can combine sailing with huge cinematographic projects. If one can do a film like ‘Aquarella’, more than that is possible as well.
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In the footsteps of David Attenborough
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An iceberg, photo: Arctic Yachts
Not long after that, Madej started to develop a project – a documentary in several parts, concerning humans’ relationships to nature. He aimed for the sky, aware that his endeavour would demand huge investments.
He decided to create a film whose characters would be people and nature, in the setting where they encounter each other most often – on the ocean shore. He wanted to sail around all of the continents within 15 years, accompanied by professional film crews, in order to tell a story about shores as places where civilisation sometimes clashes with nature, but sometimes coexists with it in perfect harmony. Places where the human being is a part of nature and, at the same time, places which constitute the biggest threat to the survival of the human race.
It didn’t terrify him that such a film would require an enormous expenditure. Just the building of a yacht , suited to the needs of a film crew and allowing for operating on seas and oceans of the world, would consume at least 5 million EUR.
To obtain the funds, he knocked on doors of world’s largest corporations – from National Geographic to Redbull. Aquarella being shortlisted for the Oscars made it easier. Madej wanted to execute his project American-style – treating it as an investment which would pay off and bring in income. To achieve that, he needed a wide audience and, naturally, big broadcasters. The European funding system, based mainly on non-returnable state grant-aid, provided no chance for executing such a large project. Hence, Madej exchanged sailor’s jackets for elegant suits and participated in most prestigious film fairs, meeting potential producers ready to provide sufficient funds. To better understand the meanders of film production, he even studied in the Wajda Film School.
Corona-obstacle
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Whales, photo: Arctic Yachts
The pandemic negated Madej’s efforts. In conversation with Culture.pl, he recalls:
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When the coronavirus-related panic started, the whole world stood still. People stopped answering their e-mails, everything closed down and no one knew what would happen next.
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Madej had to cancel previously appointed meetings with sponsors from Los Angeles and re-think his project. Instead of trying to convince big corporations, he decided to develop a platform which would enable him to fulfil his dreams, while also broadening his qualifications.
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A boat in the Arctic, photo: Arctic Yachts
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I wasn’t starting from scratch. I already knew where I was going and why. I just needed to think of a form that would be realistic considering the new circumstances and that would be tied to costs that I could cover independently.
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That’s how the project of the online platform Expedition Sailing Virtual Boat Show came to be. In order to create it, Madej gathered a group of passionate individuals who have devoted their lives to travelling and exploring the Arctic. Amongst them are biologists studying the habits of Arctic animals, photographers executing their artistic projects, yacht captains leading expeditions to the far North – and even a choreographer, who is also the official painter of the Royal Danish Navy.
Awakening consciousness
Thanks to the online platform, all of them will be able to share their stories about the Arctic, the projects that are being developed there and unique film materials depicting unknown northern frontiers.
For Madej, it’s another step meant to lead to the realisation of his great project, as well as a way to creatively use the pandemic time, given the limitations it imposes on both the film industry and the sailing industry. It’s also a way to help the viewers develop their ecological consciousness. In conversation with Culture.pl, he says:
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Although the Arctic is secluded form big urban centres, its devastation is progressing at an alarming rate. One can clearly see the advancing climate change, which destroys the environment, and microplastic is present in the ocean even to the north of Svalbard.
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A seal, photo: Arctic Yachts
The documentary miniseries initiated by the Polish sailor is meant to constitute a call to enjoy the beauty of the Arctic consciously and responsibly. Given that five million tourists each year visit Iceland – with its 300 000 inhabitants – their responsibility for the climate change is growing. Two years ago, when Madej was sailing on the wild waters around Svalbard, the 330-metre long MSI Princessa entered the harbour, a cruise ship powered by heavy fuel, built on Kadaffi’s commission under the condition that his son designs a 120-tone aquarium for sharks. There were 6,000 people on board, and all of them wanted a photo with a bear. He claims:
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Such travelling makes no sense. For the tourists from Princessa, it constitutes only an ersatz of a genuine Arctic experience. Even if they do take a selfie with a bear, the ecological footprint they leave behind has got a damaging effect on the entire ecosystem. David Attenborough believed that without undertaking drastic changes to protect the environment, we will all go extinct within 100 years – I consider it a rather optimistic estimate.
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Navigating in the Arctic, photo: Arctic Yachts
Madej prefers a minimalist lifestyle and environmentally conscious travelling. He doesn’t buy things he doesn’t need, and he doesn’t need much. He explains:
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I’ve never been interested in fame and being in the spotlight. Neither have I wanted to make a fortune. As a sailor, I don’t need a house, a car or sacks of gold, as I spend most of my life on the water. What has always driven me was a sense of purpose, a feeling that what I do is meaningful and the fact that my actions may reverb and generate something good.
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The online documentary project is meant to be the first step towards sensitising the audience to what they can do for the environment, to how much they have in common and how much divides them, and to what choices we may want to make in the name of progress. However, Madej’s still not giving up on his filmic mega-project. He just wants to realise it in a different way than he originally intended.
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I don’t want to put huge pressure on myself and rush towards some dream. It doesn’t matter if I achieve it today or tomorrow; a slight postponement will affect no one. All that matters is that I make use of every moment as much as the rest of the world allows. I want to act with passion while simultaneously enjoying life, feeling the wind in my sails, learning all the time and consistently approaching my goal.
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