Magnum Editions: On board the Spanish trawler “Rowanlea”, 1998

Over 14 years, French photojournalist Jean Gaumy captured the fierce conditions facing the fishermen who worked on open-deck trawlers, capturing the harsh reality of life at sea. In an extract from Pleine Mer: Men At Sea, Gaumy wrote of his time on board the boats, being “hurled when the boat dives, the steep and greasy stairs we climb become a pestle as we go over a wave. The iron airlock. The sticky air of diesel vapors. The large linoleum imitation floor, blistered, brown and greasy. Everything flutters about. The portholes’ light is dancing on the walls and behind the thick glass, the sea runs off distorting the vision. The unpredictable grey sky devastated with spindrifts, and the ocean at the edge, full of white flurries”