Dalziel + Scullion

Crop 2015

This short film frames a stationary view of the flowering heads of oilseed rape and the correlation between a warming sun, fluctuating wind and swarms of St Marks Flies, whose intensity and noise reflect subtle elemental shifts of sunlight and wind speed.

Theses flies emerge to perform their mating flight around St Mark’s day, the 25th April. Slightly menacing, with their legs dangling, they repeatedly fly up and down hedgerows, undergrowth and crops in great numbers. After mating the females lay fertilised eggs in the ground and then die. When hatched, the larvae feed on rotting vegetation and roots throughout autumn and winter. Around St Mark’s day the following year, a new generation emerge ready to begin their dancing flight and short adult lives.