Depth & Altitude
An expedition to document wildlife from the depths of the Bay of Biscay to the adjacent high altitude environment of the Picos de Europa on the North Coast of Spain.
Depth
“Even witnessed from a busy passenger ferry complete with cabaret acts, nowhere else I have been in the world has truly felt like a wilderness in the way the Bay of Biscay did for me on that initial crossing. I was inspired by the energy it gave me to draw, wanting to capture everything at once; painting the shapeshifting sea and sky, scrabbling to outline whales as they momentarily broke through the waves into our shared atmosphere and imagining the places they can inhabit with one inhalation for hours below me; a looking glass landscape of reverse canyons and peaks, mirroring the mountains appearing on our southern horizon.”
Altitude
“Trekking through the Picos de Europa, I was immersed in nature for a month, observing wildlife every day and for the first time learning to identify those methods of field drawing that work for me. I made it to my highest camp over 2000 metres after 21 days walking and drawing. The scenery was breath taking, snow finches and accentors flitted in and out the steel grey clouds at eyelevel and green cols bristled with the energy and roars of rutting Rebeco. Overnight, the first snow arrived, I struck camp and beat a retreat down the mountain, pausing constantly to frantically draw as much of the high-altitude life around me as I could, but with the snow line biting at my heals, I had to keep moving.”
The Route
21 days trekking and drawing through the Picos de Europa
