IMAGESofFISHERMEN.COM

Here’s a special offer for the rest of 2009. Order the ultimate photography book on life on the fishing grounds, IMAGES OF FISHERMEN: The North Atlantic at only 258 DKK.* As a bonus, at no additional cost, you will also get our 2010 Wall Calendar, value approximately 125 DKK.**

With 200 large-size color photos taken by photographer Maria Olsen, IMAGES OF FISHERMEN is no ordinary coffee-table book, presenting truly astounding pictures from the amazing life on board 6 different vessels fishing off Greenland, Iceland, Faroe and Shetland. The photographs, together with stories written by Búi Tyril and an expert treatise by world-renown fishery adviser Menakhem Ben-Yami, make the book truly unique and a must-have for anyone interested in quality documentation of commercial fishing and life at sea.

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“Marias photos give a nostalgic kick in my heart and provoke a longing for my good old days on the seven seas,” the Faroese member of parliament Mr. Tórbjörn Jacobsen said in his opening speech for the exhibition “Havfiske – seks ture på Nordatlanten” (Ocean Fishing – Six Trips on the North Atlantic) at the Nordatlantens Brygge in Copenhagen.

The 22 May opening was attended by mostly Danish and Faroese visitors, including Mr. Herálvur Joensen and Mr. Árni Olafsson of the Representation Office of the Faroes in Copenhagen, Mr. Ásmundur Guðjónsson of the Nordic Council in Copenhagen, and Nanna Hermansson, of the Swedish Faroese Society.

SLIDE SHOW: Click here to view photos…

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/>On the occasion of the release of my book “IMAGES OF FISHERMEN: The North Atlantic”, a traveling photo exhibition is set to be open at Nordatlantens Brygge in Copenhagen next week. The exhibition kicked off successfully at the National Maritime Museum in Stockholm last year and will later be taken to Esbjerg, Reykjavík, Tórshavn and Nuuk, backed by the prestigious Nordic Culture Fund as one of the main sponsors of the event. You are all warmly welcome to the reception opening between 4 - 6 PM, the 22nd of May.

Mayor Gunvá við Keldu (centered) with Kristian Martin Rasmussen and his sons Jón (left), Eyðun (middle right) and Bogi (upper right) Rasmussen; the owners of fishing company Hvalnes/Christian í Grótinum. Photo: Dávur Winther

Last week, on the 8th of May, Norðborg, a queen of the seas, finally arrived in its home port of Klaksvík. Hundreds of people were lining up to welcome the vessel and Klaksvik’s mayor Gunvá við Keldu held a speech with brass music and song adding the right feeling to the event. The 83.5m long pelagic factory trawler, the world’s most advanced of its kind, has accommodation for 30 people, and the newbuilding was delivered with the most modern electronics, fish-finding and communication equipment — and a 2500m3 refrigerated fish room that can hold 1400 tonnes of frozen products of herring, blue whiting or mackerel.

Under the heading “Let’s slay the Green Monster — to restore fishing’s reputation” journalist Quentin Bates writes in the April 2009 issue of the monthly Fishing News International: “Faroese writer Búi Tyril, who is co-author of Maria Olsen’s book Images of Fishermen… is a man with fishing in his blood, who has chosen to examine the possibilities a publicity campaign by the fishing industry could have as part of his master’s degree in corporate communication and public affairs at Aberdeen’s Robert Gordon University, Scotland.”

The FNI article goes on: “Búi Tyril’s report, while written primarily as a university assignment, doesn’t pull its punches. It identifies reasons for the fishing industry’s terrible public image as well as many of those responsible for it.”

The full title of the report is “Meet the Green Monster: How the fishing industry could employ public relations principles and techniques to combat a global threat posed by powerful pressure groups.”

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I just remember, when I looked through my archives, skipper and part owner Bogi Rasmussen once took a photo of me when I had just boarded the old Nordborg from a raft after some days on board the trawler/purse seiner Christian í Grótinum. What still strikes me is the memory of that amazing night – I’ll never forget the beautiful stillness in the foggy atmosphere mixed with the reflection of the lights from the two ships.

I was totally surrounded by the water which softly shaped small silver waves with fulmars riding on them looking for food. If I were to reach out my hand I could easily touch them. Bogi would ask me, “Where do you want to photograph? I can take you all the way from southwest off Iceland to the Faroes, if you like…”

See some of the photos I took that night in the chapter “Pelagic Pair Trawling for Herring with Christian í Grótinum and Norðborg” in the book Images of Fishermen: The North Atlantic.

Earlier this autumn a fisheries conference was held at the Sjöhistoriska Maritime Museum in Stockholm in connection with my photo exhibition “Ocean Fishing — Six Trips on the North Atlantic”. The central theme of the conference dealt with how to develop sustainable fisheries management in the Nordic countries and among the invited speakers were Ásmundur Guðjónsson, representative from the Nordic Council in Copenhagen, stated in his presentation that there is no common management policy in the Nordic countries — but 8 different ones.

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When Carolina Blaad, the press contact at the Sjöhistoriska Maritime Museum did an interview with me (in Swedish), she asked me to describe how it was to be on board the boats. Well, I answered:

“I wanted to see how it was for the fishermen to work and live on a fishing boat. I found it fascinating, like a hidden world — unknown by us living on land. But after being with them for a while, the thought struck me that they really love what they are doing and can hardly be without it even if conditions are very tough for many of them and often involves a lot of hard work…”

AUDIO: Click here to hear Carolina Blaad’s interview…

SLIDE SHOW: Click here to view photos…

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I promised Búi, my husband, to show his photos mixed with my own shots on this blog from a fishing trip we did this summer in the Faroe Islands. I was quite impressed with some of the photos that he got even if he became a little seasick (he forgot to take the pill and it was ages since he’d been out at sea in a fishing boat) and got a lot of water drops on the lens…

So me and Búi did one trip each with the Áargarður, a combined coastal longliner and jigger registered in the fishing village of Leirvík. The boat is operated and partly owned by Anker Dýrdarklett Hansen, a longtime professional fisherman with particular experience in inshore fishing.

SLIDE SHOW: Click here to view photos…

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The grand opening of the the exhibition ‘Ocean Fishing — Six Trips on the North Atlantic’ was very successful with around sixty people showing up, including the Danish ambassador in Sweden, people from the Icelandic Embassy, and Faroese people living in Sweden. The managing director of the Sjöhistoriska Maritime Museum, Hans-Lennart Ohlsson, was enthusiastic and looking forward to host the exhibition for seven months – with the opportunity to reach out to schools and the general public during the fall.

SLIDE SHOW: Click here to view photos…

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