Director Statement

For many years, I immersed myself in the writings of polar explorers. Among the most influential was Barry López’s Arctic Dreams, in which he poses questions that continue to resonate deeply with me: How do people imagine the landscapes they inhabit? How does the land shape the imagination of those who dwell within it? And how does the very desire to comprehend shape what we come to know?

These reflections have become a quiet compass in my work, guiding both the stories I choose to tell and the way I approach them.

It was this spirit of inquiry that led me, almost by chance, to Konrad Steffen—known to many simply as “Koni”—a renowned climate scientist and central figure in my film ICEMAN. We first met in Boulder, Colorado, during his tenure as director of CIRES (Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado). At the time, I was researching a documentary on the effects of climate change on Inuit communities in Greenland. Our shared fascination with the Arctic quickly sparked a connection, and I asked if I might one day join him at Swiss Camp, his remote research station on the Greenland Ice Sheet.

A year later, I found myself standing beside Koni at Swiss Camp, immersed in the rhythms of glaciological research and the quiet urgency of environmental imbalance. This film emerged from that experience. At its core, it is not only a portrait of Koni, but also a meditation on friendship, landscape, and our enduring desire to understand the fragile systems that sustain us