MUSCA

Musca is an experimental short film that explores the shifting history of the tiny constellation Musca in the southern celestial hemisphere. Created in response to an original piece of music written by acclaimed Estonian composer Urmas Sisask as part of his Starry Sky Cycle, Musca was commissioned by Australian Artistic Director Michael Sollis for Southern Sky, a multi-arts project that reinterprets this music across art forms (digital, visual and performing arts). The score is an arrangement of Sisask’s music and was performed by the Griffyn Ensemble.

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Musca combines still images (such as star charts, planispheres, and the first photographic images of stars ever taken in Australia) with archival fragments of early science films (representing flies and bees) and poetry by writer and space environmentalist Ceridwen Dovey. It is one of four short films comprising the Archival Futures of Outer Space Film Quartet, each of which explores the relationship between humans and outer space environments in different ways.

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Musca is a production of the Archival Futures Collective. It was executive produced by Michael Sollis, with additional support from the Estonian Cultural Foundation in Australia.