Infos
2023
16mm film
exists also as digital copy with sound
Firefly handling: Tanthai Prasertkul
Funding: Northwestern University (Guy Amichay and Danny Abrams)
Thanks: Anchana Thancharoen, Bangkok University
16mm photographic film was directly exposed to the light of two captive fireflies (Pteroptyx malaccae). Inside a dark space, without camera or optics, the insects were simply placed on an analogue film strip. Using techniques described in some the earliest scientific publications on the study of fireflies the film aims to reveal traces and patterns in the most direct way possible.
The digital copy of the film is set to a soundtrack of field recordings made on location with ultrasound microphones. As the film progresses, the soundtrack gradually slows down and pulls the listener into the perceptual world of insects. Rhythmic patterns appear, previously hidden in the chirp of insects, bats and other sounds outside the human hearing range slowly become audible as flashes of light stimulate our optic nerve.
