Choreographies Towards Loss

The Great Auk was the original penguin, but disappeared in the mid 19th century. Stories and observations are woven together to create a narrative that floats between two worlds, in which the Great Auk becomes a symbol of a much larger and more urgent situation. Drawing a thread from past events to the ongoing biodiversity crisis, the film deals with loss. In the process of making the film, the artist travelled to meet various people and places with a connection to the extinct bird, from the home of the author of The Great Auk in England to the old Zoological Museum in Copenhagen, where the entrails of the last two Great Auks are kept in glass jars. The story is interwoven with close-up portraits of various seabirds taken with a Super-8 camera from Hornøya, Norway’s easternmost point and a bird sanctuary. They are all endangered, and through small moments captured on film, it is as if they have already become a memory.