Île Amsterdam — Île Amsterdam Map Poster & Print

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Île Amsterdam Map Poster & Print

Île Amsterdam is one of the most remote pieces of land on Earth, a volcanic island in the southern Indian Ocean, roughly halfway between Africa and Australia. It belongs to the French Southern and Antarctic Lands and has no permanent population. The only people living there are the rotating staff of the scientific station Martin-de-Viviès, on the northern coast, who study weather, the atmosphere and the island's wildlife.

From above the island is a compact, rounded shape. The land rises from a gentle north and east towards a high central plateau, then drops sharply on the western side, where tall sea cliffs face the open ocean. There is no road network in any real sense, only a few tracks near the station, so the outline and the texture of the terrain carry the whole composition.

An Île Amsterdam map poster is really a portrait of a coastline surrounded by empty water. The island is known to naturalists as the only breeding ground of the Amsterdam albatross, one of the rarest seabirds in the world. Printed in black and white, the shape reads almost like a seal pressed into paper: small, dense and complete, with nothing else anywhere near it.