A Galaxy of Suns premieres at Dark MOFO, Hobart
10 + 11 June, 5pm with Michaela Gleave +
Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra Chorus
A Galaxy of Suns is a smart phone app and associated choral performance event that ‘plays’ the stars as they rise and set over 360˚ of the horizon – for any location on Earth.
A Galaxy of Suns creatively interprets stellar information to generate one-off compositions specific to the exact location of each app user. The Earth is treated as a giant, spinning music box with individual stars triggering sounds and visuals as they cross over the horizon. These aural and visual expressions are related to data from the Hipparchos astronomical catalogue.
The rhythms of the composition are driven purely by the timing of the stars as they rise or set. Pitch is mapped to each star’s colour ID, a numerical value that indicates the real-life colour of the star and communicates its size, age and chemical composition. Panning is accurate to the star’s location on the horizon, and volume dictated by the distance the star is from Earth. App visuals closely map these parameters, subtle ‘starbursts’ forms appearing within the colour field, accurate to the star’s location on the horizon and rising or falling accordingly. The colour is based on the temperature and chemical composition of each star, with rapidly burning hot blue stars mapped to higher pitches and cooler old red stars mapped to the bass notes. Flashing briefly before fading to midnight, these colour fields provide a glimpse into each of these Suns – each a potential home to its very own solar system with a unique life story and relationship to the history of the universe.
A Galaxy of Suns offers an alternate way to imagine our relationship to stars and experience their presence, even in the most unlikely of locations or situations – deep in the forest, amongst bright city lights, during cloudy nights or in full midday sunshine.
The app will be released in Australia on June 21 2016, and internationally on September 23 2016.
[From this npr podcast] “Mark Zuckerberg. Bill Gates. Steve Jobs. Most of the big names in technology are men.
But a lot of computing pioneers, the ones who programmed the first digital computers, were women. And for decades, the number of women in computer science was growing.
But in 1984, something changed. The number of women in computer science flattened, and then plunged.”
[From this article at tor.com] “By studying osteological signs of gender within the bones themselves, researchers discovered that approximately half of the remains were actually female warriors, given a proper burial with their weapons.
It’s been so difficult for people to envision women’s historical contributions as solely getting married and dying in childbirth, but you can’t argue with numbers—and fifty/fifty is pretty damn good. The presence of female warriors also has researchers now wondering just how accurate the stereotypes of raping and pillaging actually are:
Women may have accompanied male Vikings in those early invasions of England, in much greater numbers than scholars earlier supposed, (Researcher) McLeod concludes. Rather than the ravaging rovers of legend, the Vikings arrived as marriage-minded colonists.
Images by Keith Skretch
Sound by Ennio Morricone, “The Big Gundown”
“To create this strata-cut animation, I planed down a block of wood one layer at a time, photographing it at each pass. The painstaking process revealed a hidden life and motion in the seemingly static grain of the wood, even as the wood itself was reduced to a mound of sawdust.”
“I welcome you to celebrate the 2014 WordStorm Festival, a biannual event that inspires, stimulates and engages audiences in the rich contemporary stories of our communities.
WordStorm in 2014 welcomes over 70 distinguished writers from across Australia including 40 writers from Alice Springs, Borroloola, Darwin, Katherine and Tennant Creek regions.
I would like to extend warm congratulations to the new team at the NT Writers’ Centre for showcasing the true strength and diversity of the NT’s literary community by presenting a program that is relevant, challenging and fun.
Hon Matt Conlan MLA
Minister for Arts and Museums”
Follow the Event using #WordStorm14 on Twitter and Instagram, and follow the social media feed on Storify.
![[From the npr podcast]](https://media.npr.org/assets/img/2014/10/17/elsieshutt-bc929f16540f905f7156e03e5ad765d1a4d8b0a9-s4-c85.jpg "[From the npr podcast]")
