Bored Panda got in touch with Martin Gregus to find out more about his experiences photographing some of the planet’s most extraordinary creatures. He’s spent hundreds of days with polar bears over the past five years, and it’s the unplanned, unexpected moments that stay with him the most. “They taught me to expect the unexpected and to appreciate the beauty of surprise. No matter how much I think I know about bears, they continue to surprise me every single day,” Martin shared. Watching a mother bear nurse her cubs, he says, is perhaps the most moving moment: “You can hear them purr.”
Reflecting on his career, the photographer explained how living with animals has shaped his approach. “I’ve learned the art of patience—though not with people. With people, I’m probably the least patient person there is. But with animals, I can sit and wait for days or even weeks, listening to nothing but my own breath and the sounds of nature around me. There is something deeply beautiful in that kind of stillness. It brings a sense of peace and perspective that I believe the world desperately needs more of today.”
Martin has also witnessed dramatic changes in the Arctic over the years. “In the past, seasons shifted by only a few days. Rainfall was reliable. Ice formed and melted at roughly the same time each year. Today, everything feels unpredictable. Cold snaps arrive in the middle of summer. Heat waves appear in the depths of winter. Ice forms in strange places, at strange times, and sometimes long-standing patterns simply fail altogether. This is the reality of a warming planet—not just change, but inconsistency in what was once a remarkably stable environment.”
Looking ahead, the photographer is constantly planning new projects in some of the most remote and challenging ecosystems on Earth. “From the great narwhal migration, to Arctic wolves, to emperor penguins in Antarctica, and elephant seals in South Georgia. I’m always searching for stories that haven’t yet been told. The challenge is that the stories I want to tell exist in some of the most remote—and expensive—places on Earth. I don’t want to travel the way many people do, arriving briefly just to see an animal for a few hours. I want to live in a place for six months or more, to truly understand what’s happening there and how the natural world behaves when we simply step back and let it be,” he said.
