the whalebone box
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The Whalebone Box is a cinematic journey to Harris with an auspicious object to return it to sand and sea. MacGillivray performed the Murdered Mermaid Song to the box in a small Norman church, channelling her Harris ancestors. Elsewhere on the soundtrack, her songs Werena Ma Heart, O John Sing Thy Songs to Me (composed for 2014 film, By Our Selves) and Border Darkness emerge from the depths.
'. . . in his wanderings across the landscape, Kötting finds a very different vision of Britishness: eccentric, romantic, anarchic, inclusive, mysterious, yet down-to-earth and unpretentious. Along for the trip are some regular collaborators: author and psychogeographer Iain Sinclair; pinhole photographer Anonymous Bosch; Scots poet-singer MacGillivray (who provides otherworldly mermaid chanting); and Kötting’s daughter Eden, who has a rare genetic disorder called Joubert’s Syndrome."
- Steve Rose, The Guardian.
Image Anonymous Bosch