Forgotten Colours of the Past

Hurley served as both official photographer and film-maker on Shackleton’s British Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition. Here he is operating a cinematograph, a motion-picture camera. His Paget plates are among the exceptionally rare surviving colour records of the expedition. Because they were used as projection slides and shown repeatedly, their colours are now severely degraded. Digital reconstruction restores the original screen colours and separates the screen structure from the photographic image. Hurley’s Antarctica can thus be seen again in colour more than a century later.

Shackleton intended to make the first crossing of Antarctica via the South Pole. Endurance became trapped in the ice before the expedition could land on the continent, turning a journey of exploration into a struggle for survival. After the ship was lost, the men made their way across ice and sea to Elephant Island. Twenty-two men then waited there for rescue for more than four months while Shackleton sought help and made repeated attempts to return. The Chilean tug Yelcho finally rescued them on 30 August 1916 — all survived.

Endurance became trapped in the Weddell Sea ice in January 1915. Over the following months the pressure gradually damaged the ship, which sank on 21 November 1915. The Endurance22 expedition found the wreck on 5 March 2022 at a depth of 3,008 metres, just over four nautical miles south of the position recorded by Captain Frank Worsley. The ship lies upright and is exceptionally well preserved.