THE DANCE OF THE NIGHT SKY shows how the origins of the Great Bear, the Pleiades and the double stars Alcar and Mizar were imagined in ancient India, and is a multi-media video for the Liverpool Planetarium.

The working title was "Ripples from the Sky Above".

This planetarium show was specially created for the planetarium in the World Museum, Liverpool, with a grant from Liverpool city council’s “ROUND THE CITY IN 80 DAYS” project.

When people take a journey from one country to another, one continent to another, one culture to another, along wit h their personal possessions they carry precious memories and favourite stories.
In RIPPLES … we will look at the stories related to stars.

From ancient age people have gazed at the stars and wondered. In India great scholars have discovered scientific facts and wrapped them in intriguing stories and passed them on. The Sun appears as a young man riding on a chariot driven by 7 horses. In India, the seven stars of the constellation, known in the west, as great bear are referred as Saptarshi the seven wise men,
Using these stories as the starting point we will make a video incorporating narrative dance pieces with the images of the stars and create a show for LIVERPOOL PLANETERIUM.

In 2000 as a part of ace’s year of the artist programme the artistic director collaborated with the same team of artists to create 7 shows for the public at the Jordell Bank science centre. This was the very first time a theme of non European interpretation of the heavenly bodies were presented in the planetarium in Jodrell bank Science centre .

We have already opened a discussion about this project with the museum. They have expressed interest in showing the video as a part of their regular show and expressed interest in a possible non European themed season in future.

Concept – Bisakha Sarker
Film – Dan Saul
Script – William Radice
Design – Ali Harwood
Dance – Kali dass, Shane
Music – Arun Ghosh

On Saturday 11th March 2006 at 12 noon Chaturangan launched its dance installation programme "Dance of the Night Sky" for Liverpool Planetarium. This is a Planetarium show based on an ancient Indian myth about the origin of the Plough, the Pleiades and the double stars Alcar and Mizar. The installation was shown every Sunday afternoon through 2006 and 2007 at the Planetarium. See the review by Paul Ishtar.

" I found the museum show an intelligent and alchemical synthesis of dance, myth and science. The show was not only very entertaining, but educational on both a cultural and scientific level. The filmed dance/drama performances projected onto the planetarium ceiling against a back drop of the night sky showed high quality expressive / creative Indian dance, which at the same time was traditional and highly archetypal." - Paul Ishtar