Cutting edge science, the prehistoric past and the rituals of indigenous folk collide in Dane Dodds’ strikingly assembled documentary film !AITSA, set against the stunning backdrop of The Karoo, a vast desert area in South Africa the size of Germany.
Blending talking-head interviews with beautifully shot footage of The Karoo, and all woven together with a generous sense of artistic sensibility, there is an oddly magical tinge to the film as people seek meaning in the infinite darkness that surrounds us all.
The Karoo is home to dinosaur fossils and large mysterious rocks which bear the traces of our ancient ancestors. The area is so pristine that in 2018 a giant radio telescope array was constructed in the desert, close to the nearby town of Carnarvon. The area was chosen as there is no electronic interference to affect the antennae aimed at the far corners of the universe.
In the film, Pastor Hoorn, local minister of the CPK Church, comments: “Our nothingness is what made the world interested in us. Carnarvon itself is a small town. So small that we could never have dreamed that the world would be interested in us. I feel like it was one of my happiest moments when we discovered…that a forgotten little town suddenly found itself in the middle of global science.”
“In the 1990s astronomers started asking ‘what is the next big thing we should build in radio astronomy?’” says Dr Bernie Fanaroff, Former Project Director of South Africa’s Square Kilometre Array (or SKA as it is known). It is claimed to be the biggest science project in the world at the moment, and certainly by far the biggest telescope project ever undertaken, designed to contribute to what scientists call ‘transformational science.’
“In other words it will make discoveries that transform the way we understand the universe,” Fanaroff points out, adding that it will “look so far out into the universe that you’re looking right back to a time very close to the beginning of the universe. We want to look back to the time when the first stars and galaxies were forming in the universe, the first black holes were forming.”
!AITSA blends footage of red desert sands and rocks with telescopes and electricity pylons and revels in the beauty of the telescope array slowly moving as one, as well as the ancient stones that litter the landscape.
Meanwhile the Nelspoort Rock Art Site in The Karoo contains the greatest number of rock engravings in the whole of South Africa. At the site are drawings by the San and the Khoi and many others from the colonial period, the oldest dating back 12,000 years. The Bushmen discovered that if they scratched the surface of these dolorite rocks they could create engravings on the light brown layer. “A rich history has been captured on these rocks,” says the Nelspoort Rock Art Site custodian.
The Blombos Ochre, held at Iziko South African Museum in Cape Town and created about 77,000 years ago, is a stone containing intentional markings that make it possibly the first example of human self-reflection. “The Western idea of rock art is always art for art’s sake,” says Dr Wendy Black, curator of archaeology at the Museum. “What we have seen is that is generally not the case. The rock art is related to a spiritual tradition, usually linked to a trance experience. So you have unusual figures like anthropomorphs, which are half-human, half-antelope…it’s really about an experience of a trance event that is being recorded for posterity.”
The film delicately and compassionately questions what the land means to the indigenous people who have inhabited the area for time immemorial and remain deeply connected to this unspoiled land. The colonial past is still a factor, and the film also touches on the impact SKA has on the region, but at heart !AITSA is about the fascinating juxtaposition of two cultures, and what how modern science can relate to, interpret or add to the deep local knowledge of the place and its history?
Denmark/South Africa, 2023, 89mins
Dir/scr: Dane Dodds
Production: Med Cine
International sales: Taskovski Films
Producers: Clara Sølvsteen, Dane Dodds
Cinematography: Adriaan De La Rey, Dane Dodds
Editor: Marte B. Aasen
Music: Simon Kohler
