:: microstructures :: prototype :: is a DIY process driven experiment investigating the microstructures of plants (moss), organisms (Artemia) and sound (“It’s a small world (after all)”). Three devices were sacrificed during this initial phase ~ a PS3 camera, a microscope and a digital microscope.

A colony of Artemia were incubated, hatched and will grow over the seven days of this exhibition. Artemia is a primitive arthropod with a segmented body and broad leaf-like appendages. They undergo cryptobiosis or anhydrosis, a condition of apparent lifelessness or “hidden life”. The astronaut John Glenn took Artemia into space in 1998 aboard Space Shuttle Discovery. After nine days in space, they were returned to Earth, and hatched eight weeks later apparently unaffected by their travels.

'It’s a small world (after all)' has been manipulated and time stretched revealing the hidden structures within the composition. The song was originally sung and recorded in various studios around the world – by a church choir in London, TV performers in Mexico City, a school chorus in Rome, and by local children from Tokyo and California. It is argued that this song is the single most performed and most widely translated song on earth, and is the only Disney creation never to be copyrighted.

Collaboration by Kirsty Boyle and Dane Middleton.