For the November Issue of Backcountry Magazine, we’re highlighting the most influential spouses, siblings, parents and kids in the sport, focusing on more than 30 families who enrich the backcountry community with their love for each other and the outdoors.
And this past week, featured sisters Nat and Anna Segal released a Kickstarter to fund their sibling film project, Finding the Line, shot by Bjarne Salén.
They hope to raise $35,000 AUD by Thursday, December 1, to have a successful Kickstarter campaign.
Here’s more about the sisters and their ongoing video endeavor from the Family Issue.
Nat and Anna Segal are a driven, dynamic sister duo. They grew up in Melbourne, Australia where their parents had them on skis at an early age. As the years progressed, Anna moved into the world of professional slopestyle skiing, taking home fourth place at the 2014 Sochi Olympics in her main event. Nat opted to pursue the Freeskiing and Freeride World Tours, where she continues to compete.
But while Nat and Anna may have originally chosen different paths in skiing, they use each other as inspiration in life and on snow.
“I think in terms of having a sister in the sport, I wasn’t trying to be exactly like Anna, but it was definitely a mark to move toward,” Nat, 28, explains of her older sister’s impact on her own ski career. “Until I was 15 or 16, I always looked up to Anna and she always set the bar for what I should strive toward.”
And Anna, 30, has found new paths to follow after stepping away from competitive slopestyle events.
“Nat has been really influential in my doing more backcountry skiing and doing more self-motivated projects,” Anna says. “It helped me wean myself off of the competition circuit and find new ways that I could make skiing work for me.”
To illustrate their growth, Nat and Anna are working on a film shot by Bjarne Salén, called Finding the Line, due out fall 2017. The video will follow the sisters in their international pursuits while they discuss life, fear and dealing with complicated emotions and situations on and off the slopes.
Salén chose to profile the sisters because he was drawn to their unique take on communication and emotion. “They have a broader perspective than a lot of other skiers out there,” he says. “The film isn’t about them really, even though they are the ones skiing in it. It is more about the message.”
And the message about good communication in the face of fear, and how to better approach a life lived on the line, is something that transcends the bond of sisterhood.
“Between other people there can be a barrier of relatability. But the two of us have so many shared feelings and experiences,” Nat says. “Having that bond, especially with your sister, makes everything a bit easier. She is a ski partner who sees the world the way I do, who has similar goals and similar expectations in terms of backcountry skiing and big-mountain skiing. We have similar barriers and points where we turn around.”
It’s that balance they hope to explore and share with others. “We are all different physically and mentally,” Nat continues, “and it is good to be in a relationship that allows you to push each other in healthy ways.”
—
To learn more about the kickstarter, visit kickstarter.com, and to purchase the Family Issue, visit shop.holpublications.com.
Related posts: