The daily cycle of light and dark has remained constant for all of the evolutionary time. This short film explores artificial light pollution as part of the urban ecologies and the direct impacts on life in the light-flooded city.
One of the predominate issues light pollution causes is the obscured view of the night’s sky, with the sky transforming from pitch black to orange/brown hues. Through this, we lose a sense of the vastness that our universe holds and we become fixated on the small, brightly lit planet we inhabit.
Throughout human history, we have been navigating by using the night sky and constellations. It is an important part of astronomical, navigational, and religious purposes, highlighting the inseparable connection between humans and the observable universe. The same goes for the animals whose life depends on navigating via the night skies, either following specific stars, Moon, or parts of the Milky Way galaxy. In the great hierarchical scheme of the city’s ecosystem, human dwelling areas are becoming areas solely for humans, leaving no space for other species, influencing already disturbed cosmologies we share in the human/nature complex. By not including any human characters we imply their presence through the light without explicitly depicting them. However, the film is not without a protagonist, which in this case is light itself, portrayed as illusive, sometimes mesmerising and often overwhelming. A combination of still shots of various lengths and moving shots emphasise the uninterrupted omnipresence of the main protagonist, while interruptive and chaotic footage portrays the natural balance of night and day being out of sync.
Ultimately, the film explores how our planet depends on the various influences from the inner and outer space objects, and how humans, although the most advanced species on our world at the moment, are constantly disregarding this fact.
This film is a collaboration with Harmony J. Bury and Oliver Harris, and will be premiered at IUCN World Conservation Congress in Marseille, 2021.