Posts Tagged astronauts

First Women

tereshkova

Valentina Tereshkova orbited the Earth 48 times during her three day spaceflight in Vostok 6 in 1963. First woman in space!


A friend pointed me to these excellent and quirky sketches of the first 14 women in space. Actually, to be precise, the first 13 women in space, and a sweet sketch of Christa McAuliffe. In the artist’s words:

Working for months at a time just penciling a comic book I started these portraits to get a bit of inking and colouring out of my system. I shouldn’t say ‘portraits’, I’m not going for much of a likeness. Usually I’ll glance at a couple of photographs and then go off and draw a vague impression. Margaret Seddon is blonde, Judith Resnik is a bit barmy looking, that sort of thing.

I started with Valentina Tereshkova in January 2009 thinking if I drew one every week I’d finish the series around the end of the year. See how well that worked out.

Regardless of how fast or slow the series is coming, I think they’re very unique — Valentina Tereshkova is my favorite, but I also really like his Judith Resnik.

savitskaya

Svetlana Savitskaya

ride

Sally Ride

resnik

Judith Resnik

fisher

Anna Fisher



Credit for all images in this post: http://www.flickr.com/photos/planetbond/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

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The Art of Robert McCall

Handshake in Space, by Robert McCall

“Handshake in Space” by Robert McCall

The great space artist Robert McCall passed away on February 26 at the age of 90. McCall’s illustrations of the space age are nothing but iconic, and epic in scale. I’ve seen the Opening the Space Frontier, The Next Giant Step mural at Johnson Space Center, and would love to see the others. If nothing else, you’ve seen his work on stamps, mission patches, and 2001: A Space Odyssey posters. He will be missed.

February 28, 2010 — An artist whose visions of the past, present, and future of space exploration have graced U.S. postage stamps, NASA mission patches, and the walls of the Smithsonian, Robert McCall died on Friday of a heart attack in Scottsdale, Arizona. He was 90.

Once described by author Isaac Asimov as the “nearest thing to an artist in residence from outer space,” McCall’s paintings first attracted the public’s attention in the 1960s on the pages of LIFE, illustrating the magazine’s series on the future of space travel. He expanded on that theme at the invitation of director Stanley Kubrick, who had McCall paint the advertising posters for his seminal 1968 science fiction film, “2001: A Space Odyssey.”
collectSPACE

Opening the Space Frontier, The Next Giant Step, by Robert McCall

“Opening the Space Frontier, The Next Giant Step” by Robert McCall

NASA has a gallery of his work online; collectSPACE has this excellent post, and NASA Watch has additional links.

Orion Leaving Space Station, by Robert McCall

“Orion Leaving Space Station” by Robert McCall

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Cosmonauts

The White Cosmonaut by Jeremy Geddes

“The White Cosmonaut” by Jeremy Geddes - Oil on Board, © 2009

I find these paintings by Jeremy Geddes utterly fascinating, particularly his attention to architectural detail. The contrast between grounded, photo-realistic detail and a sense of… floating… is quite striking. Also, I really love the colors of Freeway. (Via Curved White.)

Freeway by Jeremy Geddes

“Freeway” by Jeremy Geddes - Oil on Board, © 2007

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More Space Tees

I Only Surf on Comets by Peter Kramar

“I Only Surf on Comets” by Peter Kramar

Posting two cool tees I saw recently on Threadless (via @moonrangerlaura.)

The Milky Way by Budi Satria Kwan

“The Milky Way” by Budi Satria Kwan

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Spacemen Rock

Spacemen Rock

I absolutely MUST have this shirt. Spacemen DO rock! (I especially love the cymbal and hi-hat details where the command module antennae would be.)

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Room With A View

One of the things delivered to the International Space Station this trip is the Cupola, a seven-windowed dome giving the residents a 360° view. Above, removing launch restraint bolts from the Cupola’s windows:

ISS022-E-066884 (17 Feb. 2010) — NASA astronaut Nicholas Patrick, STS-130 mission specialist, participates in the mission’s third and final session of extravehicular activity (EVA) as construction and maintenance continue on the International Space Station. During the five-hour, 48-minute spacewalk, Patrick and astronaut Robert Behnken (out of frame), mission specialist, completed all of their planned tasks, removing insulation blankets and removing launch restraint bolts from each of the Cupola’s seven windows.

Below, moving it from place to place with the robotic arm (it’s in the middle of the picture, still covered with insulation blankets):

Installing a Room With a View

In the grasp of the Canadarm2, the cupola was relocated from the forward port to the Earth-facing port of the International Space Station’s newly installed Tranquility node. The cupola is a robotic control station with six windows around its sides and another in the center that will provide a panoramic view of Earth, celestial objects and visiting spacecrafts. With the installation of Tranquility and cupola, the space station is about 90 percent complete.

Image Credit: NASA

And here is the final result, courtesy of astronaut Noguchi Soichi:

Cupola windows open toward Sahara desert

“Let there be light! Cupola windows open toward Sahara desert. Priceless!”

EDIT: And here’s a hi-res NASA image taken just after, can see the Sahara better — but Soichi was FIRST. ;)

Cupola view of Sahara desert

ISS022-E-066972 (17 Feb. 2010) — This image is the first taken through a first of its kind “bay window” on the International Space Station, the seven-windowed Cupola. The image shows the Sahara Desert spread out through the array of windows. The Cupola will house controls for the station robotics and will be a location where crew members can operate the robotic arms and monitor other exterior activities.

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To The Stars!

First Spaceship on Venus

First Spaceship on Venus (from the 1960 East Germany/Poland film)

Handpicking a few — just a few — from Dark Roasted Blend’s latest installment of their “Retro Future: To the Stars!” series of fantastic retro space art.

"The War Against The Rull" by A. E. Van Vogt

Fragment of the cover of The War Against The Rull by A. E. Van Vogt; image via modern_fred @ Flickr

These three are my favorites from this round; I find the space cowboys especially charming:

Fragment of the Grosset & Dunlap 1950 "Book of Model Spaceships"

Fragment of the Grosset & Dunlap 1950 Book of Model Spaceships

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Show and Tell

Reproduction of 1965 Astronaut Barbie

So I saw this rereleased 1965 Astronaut Barbie over at Out of the Cradle last month. She’s pretty chic, very Sixties. Nice hair.

But I have to show you MY Astronaut Barbie because, well, I think she’s just SO MUCH BETTER:

Astronaut Barbie

Astronaut Barbie -- We girls can do anything! (1985)

Oh yeah… NINETEEN EIGHTY-FIVE, BABY!

Astronaut Barbie 1985 Astronaut Barbie 1985

I love my Astronaut Barbie — she has awesome puffy sleeves (“straight out of Dynasty!”, says my best friend), a hot pink mini-skirt for dates after a long day of exploring space, an enormous fishbowl helmet, and amazing knee-high hot pink boots! (And an amusing “personal computer” with windup scrolling screen.)

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S is for Space

Artwork by Paul Thurlby

See the rest of the alphabet over here. (Via Abduzeedo.)

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Technicolor Astronaut

Abduzeedo Wallpaper of the Week #80 - James White

A really awesome wallpaper/desktop pic, full of color and light, courtesy of Abduzeedo. Also comes in an iPhone version.

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