Week 9: Space + Art

Discovery One from 2001: A Space Odyssey Taken from Wikipedia

 

 As an aspiring sci-fi writer, space is of course a topic that is very near and dear to my heart.The imagination of the writers who first imagined space travel long before the days of the space race and Yuri Gagarin is astonishing. The fact that Jules Verne could imagine a journey from the earth to the moon, a century before Apollo 11 and prior to the Wright Brothers' birth, and describe weightlessness and roughly predict the general design of the spacecraft, is astonishing. It's also fascinating how many concepts for inventions that became reality, or are being actively pursued, were first popularized by writers, like Arthur C. Clarke's ideas of satellite communication and the space elevator. It's hard to think of sci-fi nowadays without thinking of spaceships and rockets-- though most of the time, space ends up being treated as a fancy ocean, works like one of my personal favorites, the Expanse, really opens our eyes to how the human experience can be fundamentally changed by cutting our anchor to Mother Earth.

Taken from The Verge

    Beyond science fiction, however, I was surprised to learn that humans have already put art into space. With the huge expenses associated with taking anything into orbit, I assumed that art would have been less of a priority than keeping astronauts alive and advancing military, economic, and scientific goals-- but clearly, I was wrong. One example of art in space is the Cosmic Dancer Sculpture created by Arthur Woods, whose work went up to the Mir space station in 1993, exploring the effects of zero gravity on sculpture.Woods now plans to use 3-D printing to make a new version of the sculpture on the ISS, thus avoiding the problem of sending up art in a rocket. Another example is Planet Labs, whose small satellites all carry art. As impractical as art may seem in the usually necessarily spartan environment of space, the very inhumanity of conditions in outer space and other planets may necessitate the creative use of art to keep astronauts from going mad. I'm excited to see what fascinating new possibilities for art are opened up by our expansion into space.  

Cosmic Dancer Taken from Ars Astronautica

 

Works Cited:

“Arthur C. Clarke.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 24 May 2021, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_C._Clarke.

“The Leonardo Space Art Project Working Group.” Leonardo Space Art Project, Leonardo Space Art Project Working Group, spaceart.org/leonardo/vision.html.

Woodfill, Jerry. “FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON by Jules Verne.” NASA, NASA, 30 Nov. 2004, er.jsc.nasa.gov/seh/vernorig.html.

Woods, Arthur. “Cosmic Dancer - a Space Art Intervention by Arthur Woods.” Cosmic Dancer 2.0: Arthur Woods : Space Artist, www.cosmicdancer.com/cosmic_dancer_2.0.php.

Zolli, Andrew. “These Mini Satellites Have An Unexpected Addition: Beautiful Art.” Fast Company, Fast Company, 21 Mar. 2014, www.fastcompany.com/3027872/these-mini-satellites-have-an-unexpected-addition-beautiful-art.

Image Credits:

“Discovery One.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 27 May 2021, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discovery_One.

Liptak, Andrew. “Amazon Has Renewed The Expanse for a Fifth Season.” The Verge, The Verge, 27 July 2019, www.theverge.com/2019/7/27/8932968/amazon-the-expanse-renewed-fifth-season-james-sa-corey. 

Woods, Arthur. Ars Astronautica - AstroArtist Arthur Woods - Space Art Interventions, www.arsastronautica.com/.