HERBERT PONTING

Barely had the Terra Nova reached Cape Evans, where Captain Scott established the winter quarters of the British Antarctic Expedition, 1910-1913, than Herbert Ponting was excused from helping to unload the ship. Scott preferred that he take advantage of the fine weather and begin photographing the Great White South. 

As he prepared for his first outing, loading a sledge with photographic equipment, a shoal of orcas approached the ice edge. Seizing the chance to photograph these terrors of the deep, Ponting grabbed his Soho Reflex and hurried to the ice edge. Before he could raise his camera, the whales fractured the ice beneath him. Scrambling from the precarious floe to firmer ice, he saw one of them surge upwards, jaws agape and teeth gleaming – ready to drag him into the depths. Even while photographing the Russo-Japanese War, Ponting had never got so close to death.

Already renowned for his photographs of the Far East published in London’s leading illustrated magazines, Ponting was among the most celebrated ‘camera-artists’ of his day when Scott recruited him as official photographer for his expedition. Recognising its documentary and promotional power, Scott regarded Ponting’s work as a central to the endeavour. His images would publicise the expedition upon its return to Britain, reveal Antarctica to wide audiences, and help pay back its debts through illustrated lectures, exhibitions, and publications. 

The day after his near encounter with the whales, Ponting manhauled his equipment to a cluster of icebergs stranded in the sea ice about a mile from the ship. One contained a grotto into which he managed to penetrate, discovering that its opening aligned perfectly with the Terra Nova anchored in the distance. He described the grotto as an “Aladdin’s cave of beauty.” In one photograph taken from within, two companions stand at the entrance, providing a human measure by which the depth and grandeur of the grotto can be grasped. Still widely regarded as one of the most perfect images ever brought back from Antarctica, Grotto in Berg, Terra Nova in Distance might well have earned the admiration of the Romantic painters Ponting so revered - artists such as J. M. W. Turner and John Ruskin.

Indeed, inspired by Romanticism, but with certain images anticipating a more modernist aesthetic, Ponting went on to record the Antarctic landscapes around Cape Evans, producing images of Antarctica that remain unmatched in their composition and technical mastery. That these images might have never seen the light of day had Ponting been taken by the orcas underlines just how fortunate we all were on that day. 

Jean de Pomereu