Drummer Laurence Pike improvises in response to field recordings of Palm Cockatoos, shot by Christina Zdenek in the Cape York Peninsula. The field footage was edited by Clemens Habicht, who filmed this performance in the UTS Data Arena.

Traces of so many people are present as you view this intimate encounter between man and bird. What does it mean to ‘play with’ another species? How could we curate an encounter with a threatened species in a way that minimises interfering with vulnerable habitat?

This is the first in a series of ‘encounters’ between musicians and animals, conceived by Zoë Sadokierski for the Animal Allegories project.