The Aleuts, the indigenous people of the Aleutian Islands, used to make a living hunting otters and other sea animals. “Baidarka” is how Russian fur hunters called their small boats made of skin. The appearance of the Aleut people rowing on the Bering Sea, a place of raging storms that is considered to have the worst weather conditions on earth, while seemingly becoming one with the kayaks that carry their hunting tools, has been described as looking like a “new kind of creature.”

These baidarkas are the result of George Dyson’s attempts to reconstruct Aleut kayaks from contemporary materials, based on his discovery of significant features the boats share with what he has been pursuing in his own kayak design. Instead of the traditionally used materials skin, driftwood and bone, Dyson works with fiberglass and aluminium. Combining beauty and functionality, his kayaks are unique masterpieces that are well appreciated by connoisseurs. The journeys of George, son of the prominent astrophysicist Freeman Dyson, and the story of the father and son’s life, are illustrated in detail in The Starship and the Canoe. Related also to the fact that this book was translated into Japanese by P3 director Takashi Serizawa, there used to be some of Dyson’s baidarkas in the P3 office.

photo: ChargeLife – A Necessary Expedition