Monday, January 4, 2016

The Artist Who Helped Invent Space Travel

Gordon Vaughan posted on my Facebook account the below link about the artwork of Chesley Bonestell..

We have mention Chesley Bonestell before but I thought you might enjoy looking at some of the images that are found on the web.
They are beautiful and have been an inspiration to many viewers.
I enjoyed seeing a big mural at the Smithsonian.
- LRK -

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Gordon Vaughan
Great article, didn't know those were all from one artist!
If Lucian Rudaux was the Grandfather of space art, Chesley Bonestell was the father. He was born on January 1, 1888, 15 years before the Wright brothers first flew and 38 years before the launch of the first liquid-fuel rocket. When he died 98 years later,…
IO9.GIZMODO.COM|BY RON MILLER
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Here is the Ron Millers article with a lot of Chesley Bonestell images used by permision.
Suggest you check them out along with the article  the gizmodo link.
- LRK -

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The Artist Who Helped Invent Space Travel

If Lucian Rudaux was the Grandfather of space art, Chesley Bonestell was the father. He was born on January 1, 1888, 15 years before the Wright brothers first flew and 38 years before the launch of the first liquid-fuel rocket. When he died 98 years later, men had walked on the moon and spacecraft had visited most of the planets and many of the moons of the solar system.

Bonestell's paintings not only anticipated 20th century space exploration, they helped to bring it about. So realistic were his depictions of other worlds that visiting them no longer seemed fantasy. His artwork looked like picture postcards taken by some future astronaut.
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The official Bonestell web site where you can view images and even buy prints if interested.
- LRK -

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LIMITED EDITION PRINT

To commemorate the 70th anniversary of the inaugural publication of Bonestell's space art, Bonestell LLC is releasing 250 limited edition art prints of Saturn as seen from Titan. The last official printing of Bonestell's Saturn as seen from Titan was in the 1970s.

Chesley Bonestell's space art first appeared in the May 29, 1944, issue of Life magazine, accompanying the article, "Solar System: It is Modeled in Miniature by Saturn and Nine Moons." The article featured a series of paintings – including Saturn as seen from Titan – depicting views of Saturn from its various satellites and presenting the audience with a realistic and magical impression of Saturn and space. Thus began the era in which Bonestell's art provided a window to explore space in magazines such as Collier's, Fantasy and Science Fiction, Life, Pic, Coronet, Scientific American, and in books such as The Conquest of Space and The Exploration of Mars.

Saturn as seen from Titan became one of Bonestell's most iconic paintings. It is also one of the paintings he would paint again and again, the view evolving with time. The print for purchase is a version he created in 1952 for his daughter, Jane Webster. It was first exhibited in the Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles, October 1957. While its second and last exhibition was in 1988 at the California Academy of Sciences.

The print was released on June 11, 2014. This date is significant: Chesley Bonestell passed away on June 11, 1986, doing one of the things he loved most – painting.

To learn more about the painting's different incarnations, read Ron Miller's essay, "The Evolution of a Space Icon." Miller co-wrote "The Art of Chesley Bonestell," and is a best-selling author and award-winning artist.

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More about Chesley Bonestell
- LRK -

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Chesley Bonestell

Chesley Knight Bonestell, Jr. (January 1, 1888 – June 11, 1986) was an American painter, designer and illustrator.[2] His paintings were a major influence on science fiction art and illustration, and he helped inspire the American space program. An early pioneering creator of astronomical art, along with the French astronomer-artist Lucien Rudaux, Bonestell was dubbed the "Father of Modern Space Art".
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Paul Spudis article about the Moon and Bonestell's artwork.
- LRK -

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Chesley Bonestell and the Landscape of the Moon
The purpose of art is to soothe the soul, but sometimes it can predict future realities with uncanny precision.

By Paul D. Spudis
airspacemag.com
June 14, 2012

The influence of the arts on our popular culture is well known. The television generation grew up with Forbidden Planet and Star Trek, shaping our sensibilities and expectations about space travel.  The genre of “space art” enlightened and expanded our minds and ignited our imaginations.  The sixties and seventies brought us  “space” artists with their startlingly realistic vistas of unvisited worlds and ancient times.  Authors, writing for all ages and levels of interest, found eager audiences.  From the beginning, the space age left an indelible mark on many.


Read more: http://www.airspacemag.com/daily-planet/chesley-bonestell-and-the-landscape-of-the-moon-120863737/#v4pA5pZJclciUylG.99
Save 47% when you subscribe to Air & Space magazine http://bit.ly/NaSX4X
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Saga pf the Bonestell Lunar Landscape
-LRK-

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http://blog.nasm.si.edu/behind-the-scenes/the-saga-of-lunar-landscape/
The Saga of Lunar Landscape
Posted on January 22, 2010 by The National Air and Space Museum

For more than a decade it has been my privilege, among my other duties, to serve as curator of the National Air and Space Museum art collection. It comes as a surprise to many folks to realize that the Museum has an art collection. In fact, it includes over 4,700 works by artists with names like Daumier, Goya, Rauschenberg, Rockwell and Wyeth, and is perhaps the finest and best-rounded collection of aerospace-themed art held by any of the world’s museums. People who are aware that I manage the Museum’s art treasures occasionally ask if I have a favorite work in the collection, I do.

Chesley Bonestell’s mural, Lunar Landscape, was unveiled at the Boston Science Museum’s Hayden Planetarium on March 28, 1957. “No spaceship reservations are needed for a startlingly realistic visit to the Moon” announced a museum press release.  Measuring forty feet long by ten feet tall, the dramatic panorama of the lunar surface was the masterwork of an artist who had done more than his fair share to set the stage for the coming of the Space Age.

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Tom D. Crouch is a senior curator in the Aeronautics Division at the National Air and Space Museum.
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Thanks for looking up with me, 
- LRK -

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WHAT THE MIND CAN CONCEIVE, AND BELIEVE, IT WILL ACHIEVE - LRK -
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