The Silent Circle

Three orbital dates: 2024, 2025, and 2026

Eduardo Kac’s The Silent Circle is an artwork that embodies the three fundamental phases of a person's life (Youth, Maturity, Elderhood) as it orbits the Earth across a multi-year mission. This shot-in-space video, with forms, colors, textures, and letters morphing seamlessly into one another, was beamed back to Earth in 2024 directly from the satellite. Credit: Eduardo Kac, Xu Bing Space Art Residency Program, and SCA-1 (Star Chain of Arts Project).

Frame from the shot-in-space MIDDAY mission, which orbited the Earth in 2025, as part of Eduardo Kac’s The Silent Circle. Credit: Eduardo Kac, Xu Bing Space Art Residency Program, and SCA-1 (Star Chain of Arts Project).

Credit: Visualization by Kac Studio based on a photograph provided by Xu Bing Studio.

The SCA-1 satellite was successfully launched in China by a Smart Dragon-3 rocket at 11:06 am on February 3, 2024 (China time). Credit: Xinhua News Agency.

Watch the Smart Dragon-3 rocket blast off from waters off the coast of Yangjiang, a city in south China's Guangdong Province, on February 3, 2024. Credit: China Central Television.

The Silent Circle

Eduardo Kac

The Silent Circle is a work of space art that engages the human experience based on the three fundamental phases in a person’s life: 1) Youth; 2) Maturity; 3) Elderhood. On one or more satellites equipped with a screen and camera, The Silent Circle poetically expresses the journey of human existence through AI-driven animations featuring these words: 1) MORNING; 2) MIDDAY; 3) MIDNIGHT. Each word has its own 2m 50s animation beamed directly to the satellite, where it is displayed, recorded, and then transmitted back to Earth as shot-in-space video. The three original labile videos show forms, colors, textures and letters morphing seamlessly into one another. Each part of this temporal triptych is seen in orbit in a phased spaceborne journey: 2024; 2025; 2026.

I created The Silent Circle for Xu Bing's Space Art Residency Program, which launched the satellite SCA-1 (aka Xingshidai 19; NORAD ID 58924) on February 3, 2024. The satellite circled the Earth once every 90 minutes until July 22nd, 2025, when it reentered the atmosphere. With SCA-1, I completed the first and second phases of The Silent Circle: MORNING and MIDDAY. The satellite SCA-2 (aka Xingshidai 21; NORAD ID 61232) was launched on September 24, 2024, and remained in orbit through 2026, when I completed the last phase of the work: MIDNIGHT.

On one of its sides, both SCA-1 and SCA-2 satellites had a conventional screen directly exposed to the harsh conditions of outer space. As seen above (top), a camera is located at the end of the solar panel facing the screen, so that the camera can capture the animation featured on the screen with the Earth in the background.

The work consists of the SCA-1 and SCA-2 satellites hosting three AI animations that I conceived and produced specifically for these satellites; they only have the intended meaning when seen through the perspective of the in-space camera. While in orbit, The Silent Circle embodies and is embodied by the satellite. The plenitude of its expressiveness takes place as duration, i.e., throughout the three year period that poetically encapsulates a human lifetime. Mission activations were implemented as planned in 2024 (MORNING), 2025 (MIDDAY), and 2026 (MIDNIGHT).

I produced one animation for each word: 1) MORNING; 2) MIDDAY; 3) MIDNIGHT. In each animation, colorful renditions of these words morph into each other, as illustrated by the stills below.

2024

The 2m 50s animation with the word MORNING was uploaded to orbit in 2024 and represents the first phase of a person’s life, i.e., Youth.

2025

The 2m 50s animation with the word MIDDAY was uploaded to orbit in 2025. It represents the second phase of a person’s life, i.e., Maturity.

2026

Frame from the animation with the word MIDNIGHT, which will be uploaded to orbit in 2026. It represents the third and last phase of a person’s life, i.e., Elderhood.

A note about the SCA-1 and SCA-2 satellites
SCA-1 (aka Xingshidai 19; NORAD ID 58924) is the first satellite of the Star Chain of Arts Project, led by artist Xu Bing. He also initiated the Xu Bing Space Art Residency Program, through which he invites artists and people from various fields to create artworks using this satellite. He describes the satellite as “the world's first communal art satellite.” SCA-2 (aka Xingshidai 21; NORAD ID 61232) has replaced the deorbited SCA-1. Many Chinese satellites carry more than one name due to sponsorships or collaborations, allowing them to serve multiple projects simultaneously. SCA-1 orbited Earth approximately every 90 minutes, at 570 km above sea level. SCA-2's orbit is approximately 400 kilometers in altitude; it completes one orbit around Earth every 93 minutes. For more on SCA-2, click here.

Eduardo Kac (left), Qiu Zhijie and Xu Bing (right)

Eduardo Kac (left), Qiu Zhijie (center) and Xu Bing (right), at the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing, on November 29, 2018, after Kac's screening of Inner Telescope. Credit: CAFA.