Antarctica 2026

I had a vision — and this is just the beginning.

Standing on Elephant Island, I kept thinking about Frank Hurley — not a sailor, but an artist among explorers, hauling large-format glass-plate cameras across ice and wind to document the expedition of Sir Ernest Shackleton. He built darkrooms in extreme conditions, protected fragile negatives, and carried the surviving plates back to the UK so the world could witness Antarctica. Today, I photographed Dominic Houlder here in colour — intentionally — as a dialogue with Hurley’s legacy.

A story of hope, endurance, art and belief in the impossible.

Dominic Houlder and the Houlder flag by the Mount Frank Houlder, Elephant Island, Antarctica - photographed by Lukas Kroulik, January 2026.

Here I have juxtaposed two images. On the right, against the green wall, the original 1914 photograph by Frank Hurley of the “Mount Frank Houlder” named by the Boss himself after Frank on the Elephant Island, Antarctica, with a handwritten dedication to Frank Houlder from Sir Ernest Shackleton. I took that image years ago because I couldn’t get over how deeply it moved me — the gratitude, the loyalty, the human bond behind the expedition.

On the left, my photograph from Elephant Island — created in dialogue with that moment in history. Not to replicate it, but to stand beside it. The juxtaposition is my way of holding past and present together — art, survival, friendship — and letting the emotion travel across time.