Country Always

Caring for Country

A Corner of the Empire

The Garden Palace

The Holding Pen

The Agricultural Hall

Regional Networks

Across New South Wales

A Museum of Doing

Technological Museum

Expanding Stories

Evolution of the Castle Hill site from botanical research station to Museum Discovery Centre

Transforming the Tramsheds

Powerhouse Stage 1 and the Harwood Building

A Symbol in Time

Sydney Observatory

Ongoing Transformations

Powerhouse Ultimo

Applied Arts and Sciences

Defining the terms in the 21st century

Stellar Nullius

Oscillations – Season 1, Episode 2

Powerhouse Renewal

A transformative renewal program across four sites

We Rise

Blak Powerhouse

Powerhouse-1 Mission Launch to the ISS

An initiative of the Powerhouse: Future Space program

2024

Exoskeleton

Powerhouse Parramatta

Powerhouse Parramatta Topping Out

Major construction milestone achieved for the new museum

2023

Stories

Stellar Nullius

Oscillations – Season 1, Episode 2

By Alexandra Spence, presented by Jon Tjiha

From heartbeats to brainwaves, economic cycles to cosmic orbits, oscillations can be found everywhere. This podcast takes artists and listeners deep into the Powerhouse Collection of half a million objects to unearth stories about the vibrations, fluctuations, and movements woven through our world – and beyond it.

Travelling through orbits and transmissions, 'Stellar Nullius' explores earth’s material relationship with space via satellite disposal and debris, and the uncanny historic connections between electronic music and space exploration.

‘What does it mean for us to be so intent on progress that the oceans and the skies, these vast, awe-inspiring places, get treated as junkyards? What are the ethical implications of littering on such a large scale? 100 million pieces orbiting the Earth.’

Alexandra Spence

Space debris, Skylab space station, titanium/fibreglass, McDonnell Douglas Astronautics Co, USA, 1970-1972. The fragment is the end cap from pressurised oxygen tank from the Skylab space station. Originally the end of an enclosed cylinder, the titanium tank structure is torn and bent as a result of the stresses that ripped it away from the rest of the vessel. The exterior is covered by a composite insulation material with a woven fibreglass outer surface. A circular lid, protruding above the external insulation, covers an access hatch to the tank. A black and red wire, possibly originally connected to an external power source or sensor, is attached to the lid. — 1/4
Space debris fragment from Skylab space station
Object No. 4/254/1-1

Transcript

Alexandra Spence This is the sound of natural radio emissions from space generated by lightning storms in the earth's atmosphere and the sun's solar wind interacting with the magnetosphere.

I recorded these spherics and tweaks in Kiama, on a cliff by the sea. It was summer, January. I took off my shoes, grounding the signal with my bare feet on the rock and my hand on the receiver.

And this is a USSR satellite fragment that I met recently. I’m tapping it gently with a soft mallet and using a paintbrush to trace its circumference, jagged and burnt from free falling through the earth's atmosphere. Landing in rural New South Wales at some point in the ‘60s or '70s.