Love fades, everything dies, but the moon looms forever in our imaginations. Organized to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the moon landing, a new show at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, in Denmark, examines how the earth’s satellite has served as a point of fascination and inspiration for artists, thinkers, writers, and scientists across human civilization. Below, we present a selection of images from the exhibition, which runs through January 20, 2019.
The first known photograph of the moon was taken by John W. Draper ca. 1839. The spots in this photo are caused by mold and water damage on the original daguerreotype, which apparently no longer exists. Photography. New York University Archives.
Max Ernst, Naissance d’une galaxie (The Birth of a Galaxy), 1969, oil on canvas. Fondation Beyeler, Riehen/Basel Beyeler Collection.
Abd al-Rahman al-Sufi, Kitab suwar al-kawakib (Book of Fixed Stars), 1675, paper, polychrome ink, gold, and silver. The David Collection, Copenhagen.
Georges Méliès, Le Voyage dans la lune (A Trip to the Moon), 1902, still from a hand-colored film, 14 minutes, loop. Lobster-Fondation Groupama Gan Foundation Technicolor. Courtesy of mk2 Films.
Fritz Lang, Frau im Mond (Woman in the Moon), 1929, still from black-and-white film, 156 minutes.
Carl Julius Leypold, Kirchhofseingang (Entrance to the Cemetery), 1832, oil on canvas. Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nürnberg. Loan by the city of Nürnberg.
Benjamin Henry Day, Lunar animals and other objects Discovered by Sir John Herschel in his observatory at the Cape of Good Hope and copied from sketches in the ‘Edinburgh Journal of Science,’ 1835, lithograph. Courtesy of the Library of Congress.
Malena Szlam, Lunar Almanac, 2013, still from a silent color film in 16mm, 4 minutes, loop.
The astronomer Johann Friedrich Julius Schmidt’s plaster model of the moon, 1898. Photo: Getty Images/Field Museum Library.
The ancient Hindu moon god Chandra, gouache on paper. Courtesy of the British Museum.
Victor Prouvé, Amour de lune (Love for the Moon), 1884, pen and ink on paper. Georgina Kelman.
Rotraut, Untitled, ca. 1972, mixed technique on canvas. Private collection. ©Rotraut/ADAGP, Paris 2018
Unknown, The first view of the Earth from the Moon, Frame 101, High Resolution, Lunar Orbiter I, 1966, vintage gelatin silver print. Collection Victor Martin-Malburet.
Excerpted from The Moon: From Inner Worlds to Outer Space, edited by Lærke Rydal Jørgensen and Marie Laurberg, published by the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art. “The Moon: From Inner Worlds to Outer Space” is on view at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art through January 20, 2019.
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