KaamosKaamos

Place

Finnish Lapland, Finland

Season

Polar night

Theme

Silence

Photographs

8 · Colour

Kaamos is the Finnish word for the polar night, the weeks in Lapland when the sun stays beneath the horizon and the day shrinks to a few hours of blue. Near Kilpisjärvi and along the frozen shores of Inari the snow absorbs every sound; even your own footsteps seem to arrive late. I worked slowly, with a tripod and long exposures, often in cold that stopped the camera. Kaamos is the quietest of my series and, I think, the most honest: a handful of birches, a frozen lake, one cabin light, and the kind of silence you only hear when there is nothing left to listen for.