The Moon Eric Nutter www.thenuttman.

com 2009

The distant moon is far away from human touch and thought, he hangs in space alone besides the occasional astronaut. And though he can reflect the best and brightest ball of light, in the end, at dark domain, you know, his passion thrives at night. So look out your window sill and up, at your night lights shimmer and glow, while the source may be bright, know this, the moon always reveals its soul.

Just Toys Hunter Lower www.saltandbattery.org 2009 Digital Perhaps the workings of the Universe are little more than an incomprehensibly childish game, and the planets themselves are mere toys in Gods sandbox.

Origin Lucas Travis lucas.travis@hotmail.com 2009 Digital

Space Suit OtherCubed www.OtherCubed.com 2009 Digital

Next Stop: Heaven David Aites www.policyoverkill.com

Time Passing Ethan Hansen www.ethanhansenphoto.com 2009 Photography

Turn Off the Lights Ethan Hansen www.ethanhansenphoto.com 2009 Photography

Spaced Declan Roache www.declanroache.com 2009 Photography

Venusian Forest Ryan Allen www.RyanAllen.com 2009 Acrylic on Aspen Wood - 18 x 24 x 2

An Astronomer The Arsteia 2009

Setting his parcel of books on the grass an astronomer unpacks his compass, his chronometer and sextant, immortalizing himself as an eternal figure of poetic solitude.

Musings on space Danny Sichel dsichel@gmail.com 2009

the thing to remember about space about the universe is how big big big big big BIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIG it is no, bigger than that loads bigger no, seriously.Youre not going to get it, so stop trying. Think about the moon. The Moon. *Our* Moon. Look at it up in the sky. See how big it is? Close one eye, hold a dime at arms length... that dime covers the moon. Thats how small it is. And its so big that it causes our tides. How far away is it, that it looks so small? Its our closest neighbor. In all existence - of EVERYTHING THAT THERE IS - there is nothing nothing NOTHING that is closer to us than the Moon. And yet. Its so far away that it *breaks simultaneity*. Do you know what that means? Do you truly *understand*, about relativity and the speed of light? Youve heard of light-years, yes? Of itll take centuries for the light from there to reach us? *That* is breaking simultaneity. The Moon is so far away that, even though its only by a second or two... it breaks our little illusion that everything takes place at once.

It really is another world. And we reached it by going UP. Going so far up that there was no up any more. Thats because the universe doesnt care about how we perceive directions. The universe is very big, and it is very cold, and it DOES NOT CARE ABOUT US. It just *is*, thats all. And its absolutely magnificent. Look around you. The world around you. Think of every place youve ever been, every real place youve ever seen on TV or in a book or whatever. The sheer *size* of the planet Earth. A few years back I went to the planetarium. The guy giving the ceiling show gave us a special treat: he set up his telescope with the super-heavy-duty filters that you need for when you point a telescope directly at the sun and look through it... and then he let us look. He pointed out sunspots: they were little dark speckles. And then he told us how big they were. Imagine... a grapefruit, at arms length. Perfectly spherical, and glowing. Now imagine that the grapefruit has some poppy seeds on it. And each poppy seed is one and a half times bigger than the whole world. And our grapefruit is an average-size grapefruit, with billions and billions more just like it. THAT.... is SPACE.

Sparrow OtherCubed www.OtherCubed.com 2009 Digital

Meteorite Thin Section from Northwest Africa fall 969 Tom Phillips Morocco LL6/7 chondrite This small stone was purchased from a Moroccan dealer by Adam and Greg Hup in June 2001. Subsequently seven more stones were purchased bringing the total weight to 463 g. An interesting thing to note about this fall is that there are traces of fluid trapped inside the main mass. More interesting is the way the fluid (possibly water) is trapped. It is contained in small round cavities in the olivine grains forming bubble trains, which can be observed with a microscope in thin section. This fluid is refered to as 4.5 billion year old bottled water. Although water has been found in a few other chondrites, it was contained in halite (salt) crystals not cavities in olivine making this a unique meteorite. Classification and mineralogy (A. Irving and S. Kuehner, UWS): Genomict breccia consisting of angular clasts in a finer grained matrix. Mostly olivine (Fa30, FeO/ MnO = 57.7) exhibiting 120 grain junctions, with subordinate interstitial troilite and Fe-Ni metal (30% Ni), and accessory orthopyroxene (FeO/MnO = 37.6), chromite, chlorapatite, interstitial sodic feldspar (Ab85Or5), and fine-grained intergrowth patches (probably former melt or mesostasis). Silicate minerals contain trains of fluid inclusions. Rare relict chondrules are present. Oxygen isotopes (D. Rumble, CIWGL): analyses of two whole rock fragments by laser fluorination returned delta^18O = +5.3 (+-0.1), delta^17O = +4.0 (+-0.1) and delta^17O = +1.22 (+-0.03) per mil. http://www.meteorite.com/meteorite-gallery/meteorites-alpha_frame.htm

Space Dementia OtherCubed www.OtherCubed.com 2009 Digital

Spaced Ryan Allen www.RyanAllen.com 2009 Digital

The Final Frontier C. V. Lucas roughdraftee.blogspot.com/ 2009

It was an overcast, humid June day when Trevor found the spaceship. He almost missed it, as it was tucked away in a corner of the scrapyard where he often played. He went there against his parents well-meant advice; finds like this kept him coming back. A wide smear of oil and mud had been smudged across its surface who-knows-how-long ago, but when the warm summer rain began to fall, the drops cut narrow swaths through the grime. The trails they left behind were white and gleaming. Seized by imagination so strong it may as well have been a physical force, Trevor stopped and stared a long while. It was taller than him--over twice as tall! Thunder grumbled in the distance, and his fathers voice was in his mind. He could hear it already, questioning why hed taken so long on the walk home from school, why his sneakers were so filthy... and so Trevor abandoned the spaceship prematurely. Not much moved out of the salvage yard once it moved in; he figured odds were high that his find would be safe. The last few school days came and went, and with each day came new additions to his project: pilfered red art class paint, a white board marker, a small box of metallic thumbtacks, duct tape from the supply closet. All squirreled away in his backpack, one at a time, right under his teachers nose. The walk from school to the yard was often a run. The supplies from school were put to good use, as was a rag hed nabbed from his mothers cleaning bucket. Soon, the surface of the spaceship was white as it had ever been, its steel accents polished to a high and pleasing sheen. He cleaned it thoroughly, inside and out. Gutted it and replaced

its white innards with more useful things. He did his best to never spend more than a few minutes a day at his work site, lest he arouse the suspicion of his parents. Or worse, Mr. Spencer, who actually owned the yard. Summer arrived full force in the meantime. Days were sweltering, school was out for good, and Trevor had endless handfuls of excuses to feed his parents about why he was spending so much time away from home. Of course, they werent all excuses: he did in fact go to a baseball game or two, rode his bike into town with the neighbourhood kids, even went on an overnight camping trip with his best friend from school. But in the end, they were shallow diversions. What he was waiting for was the perfect day. Hed seen enough on TV and read enough to know that NASA didnt just send their shuttles up into orbit unless everything was perfect. He waited as patiently as any kid his age could: not very. Storm clouds curdled the sky, or clear weather would emerge when he was nowhere near the scrapyard. Despite his growing impatience, hed not told a soul about his project. It was too risky, hed decided. What would his parents think? And finally, it arrived: a cool morning, not a cloud in the sky, no wind toying with the chimes that hung from his bedroom window. Trevor woke early and lay awake in bed, knowing in his bones that it was time. Too nervous to eat much, he ate a piece of toast, then fixed another for the road when he was ready to go. Fed his mother a line about fishing at the docks with Will Clegg down the street, which she rebutted with a home by dark. And he was free! The run to the scrapyard was a blur of heat and humidity and pavement, a brief detour through the Cleggs orchard to stuff his backpack. There wasnt much to eat in space, after all.

The yard was deserted, and he made his way to his spaceship in no time. With a grunt of effort, he jerked the door open, then climbed inside. It was predictably dark, but hed installed a pair of flashlights in the ceiling with duct tape. They illuminated the cramped space just fine. The seat was a small thing from the back of a pickup trucks cab--the nice leather seats of the old Buick in the yard had been far too heavy for him to carry. Trevor closed his eyes; the roar of the engine began to rumble in his ears. It grew louder with each passing second, and he strapped himself in, holding tight to the steering wheel hed installed. That had come from the Buick, at least. He could feel the shift in atmosphere outside, the air growing thinner as he climbed up and up and up through layers of atmosphere whose names he couldnt remember. A faint flash of heat as he exited the atmosphere altogether, and then the cool black vacuum of space. Stars dotted the horizon, faint and fuzzy. It took the search team almost a week to find Trevor Mayhew. His parents thought hed disappeared down by the river, after all. And it wasnt as gruesome as one might expect, all things considered. The boy didnt look troubled or in pain. Hed met his end peacefully, mouth stretched in the widest grin you ever saw on a boy... showing off a bit too much of a few too many teeth by that point. In his hands, he still gripped the steering wheel. Thumbtacks had been pressed like rivets through the spaceships side, a crude false window drawn in the circle they made. Painted on the door in several thick layers of red was the vessels name, scrawled by a forcibly neat eight-year-old hand: Maytag.

Area 51 U.S. Air Force www.airforce.com Mixed media with steel and concrete

Unseen Elements Kelly Nulty www.yllek.com 2009 Photography

Dreamlines Fernando Pires elentor.wordpress.com 2009

JohnDonovanLiver

Riot Police Space Invaders Michael Maurer www.michaelmaurer.net 2009 Digital

Landscape Rodrigo Bravo www.Rodrigobravo.ca 2009 Digital

The Sea Rodrigo Bravo www.Rodrigobravo.ca 2009 Digital

Silver Traveler Mark Mau 2009

She slides along the night sky, gracefully and silently, as she has long before I ever gazed upon her and will continue doing for generations to come.Yet, somehow, I feel that standing here, bathed in her silvery glow, that she is, in her own way, watching me. She watches me not as I watch her; not with quiet reverence, but rather a curiosity. Why watch me? I imagine her thinking. Am I truly that interesting? I simply move from one side of your horizon to the other perhaps you are enchanted at my beauty? But that cant be either, for in your eyes I am unique. There is not another for me to be compared to, so surely I could not be beautiful or ugly. Then why, my terrestrial observer, do you watch me so closely? My response would not come quickly. I have pondered the very same questions, and never come to a compelling answer. I hold no such curiosity for her. Not that she isnt a curious thing; traveling the blue-black heavens until the sun once again takes his fierce hold of the day. No, she is quite predictable. I knew that this evening, she would rise up in full regalia, casting the darkness away and replacing it with soft indigo. The stars behind her, all burning violently in their own right trillions of miles away, serve only to enhance the calm as she glides along. Eventually, she disappears behind the horizon, leaving her stage to those cohorts in the infinite distance. But I take solace in knowing she will return, and take the time now to explore the cosmos while lying in the dewy grass.

Godmask Rodrigo Bravo www.Rodrigobravo.ca 2009 Digital

Surveying: Bai-yu 701 Kelly Nulty www.yllek.com 2009 Photography

Moon Munny iJavaJo http://web.mac.com/ijavajoe/ 2008 Acrylic

40 Miles Aimee Cozza www.The9mmBeretta.com Acrylic ink and pen, digital

Another World Karl J. Jrna karl-jj.deviantart.com 2009 Digital

Nauticool OtherCubed www.OtherCubed.com 2009 Digital

Star Christine A. tenyoceres.etsy.com 2009 Sumi Ink on Rice Paper

One Time I Saw a Ghost Tony Via Tony_Via@ymail.com 2009

During the furor that followed Sputnik 1 and Sputnik 2, many people accused the Eisenhower administration of letting the Soviet Union best the United States. The Sputnik crisis reinforced for many people the popular conception that Eisenhower was a smiling incompetent; it was another instance of a do-nothing, golf-playing president mismanaging events. G. Mennen Williams, the Democratic governor of Michigan, even wrote a poem about it: Oh little Sputnik, flying high With made-in-Moscow beep, You tell the world its a Commie sky and Uncle Sams asleep. You say on fairway and on rough The Kremlin knows it all, We hope our golfer knows enough To get us on the ball.

Oh little Sputnik Michael Maurer www. michaelmaurer.net 2009 Digital

Nut Joanna Barnum www.joannabarnum.com 2009 Watercolor, acrylic, pen & ink

Celestial Spirograph (967) All Too Much For Me 2009

To Be Human Troy De Viet http://www.illegal-immigration.com 2009 Digital

The Galactic Cycle Liz Aragon mentaldemental.deviantart.com 2008 Mixed Media

Stardust Liz Aragon mentaldemental.deviantart.com 2009 Mixed Media

Lightspeed Timothy Daniel Flynn www.tdfillustration.com 2009 Mixed Media

Portrait 9 Aaron Rourke www.aaronrourke.com 2009 Mixed Media on Zinc and Plexiglass

Syzygy Matthew Gallaghergher www.soundstasty.com 2009

The land goes cold and the lizards dance, mountains succumb to freeze in twilight A swath of night sweeps the valley to the sand and sea. An instant midday sunset, vultures want to sleep, time twirls then ceases as we breathe in Theyre all here now Three orbs all coincide spying down at us, nothing to hide A celestial mnage a trois Luna wants the day night, but strands of Leos coruscating mane shines through A translucent scrim descends on Baha de Los Muertos Helios consumed by the Sky Dragon a predictably violent moment full of grace, with perfect timing. Running to the beach, the shadow hastens us to follow, A dream swallowed in the shore, vanishing and no more ... now out of reach. The day returns in a singular way: into the water with trigger fish, and playful waves seeing green brains of coral and ever smiling puffers. Were all here now enjoying our time, our space.

neuromantic James MacDonald lefthandpunk.com 2009 Digital

Gangliest Constable Tony Via Tony_via@ymail.com 2009

Nova Steve Kush Ruiz www.stevekushruiz.com 2009 Gouache on Paper

Nebula Rachel Benefiel www.chezlin.com 2009 Oil on canvas

Synthetic Demigod I: Giver of Life and Light Kurt Peterson 2009 digitally colored pen/ink on Illustration board

Spaces David Aites www.policyoverkill.com 2009

There is, on Earth, a special breed, So set to see the farthest land and deepest seas, That sees unseen with awe and wonder. For these the farthest lands are good as home, The strangest paths a way to roam. For these, the land has little left, As Earth is all but mapped. For them, they say, there is but space, As endless, or so they say. But what, and then, when all the stars are seen? But what, for them, when every world is known? Then, I think, they must turn to art, And artists must become, For they must turn to dreams.

Purple Skies Ethan Hansen www.ethanhansenphoto.com 2009 Photography

Rocking Lincoln 200 Ron Bandish RonBandish@Gmail.com 2009 Illustration

Stellar Bodies Nathan Hoste www.ghoste.net 2009 Ink and Digital color

Retrograde Motions Nathan Hoste www.ghoste.net 2009 Ink and Digital color

Landing Tyler Windham www.tylerwindham.com 2009 Digital

Space Porn Ovens http://www.chipperwhale.com 2009 Digital

Space & Sky Alessandro Sergio Cantatore www.alessandrosergiocantatore.com 2009

When space and sky first met cast sidelong glances cross the firmament and spent their wasted years on childrens fears that none should come between them They glared as stones were stacked, as hubris backed the hearts of men who grinned as heaven waited. Some fated few, who begged to crack the crystalline, who raised a drill to spill forth secrets of stars, who went too far and whispered words that none could know. Then flirtations flared and words were spared as engines blared and buzzed. A hazy sky was shattered by a blaze that cried, achtung! And space, awake, and glancing down, felt suddenly collapse a wall, and small deciding thing a rocket in his grasp. Clasping tight to rocketlight space and sky shook hands and, just as fast, the silver fled, they waved goodbye again.

Landing Ryan Allen www.RyanAllen.com 2009 Ink and Watercolor

The View Ryan Allen www.RyanAllen.com 2009 Ink and Watercolor

One Small Step Ryan Allen www.RyanAllen.com 2009 Ink and Watercolor

Houston We Have a Problem Ryan Allen www.RyanAllen.com 2009 Ink and Watercolor

Space

artgoons.com

All images and content contained in this book are the intellectual property of the individual contributors to this book.