Painting by Cosmas Damian Asam, 1735. Photo ©Jay Pasachoff.

In honor of this weekend’s annular solar eclipse (going right over far-northern California! WOO!), I present something from the archives, possibly the first realistic depiction of a solar eclipse in art. Enjoy watching the eclipse, and remember kids, DO NOT LOOK DIRECTLY AT THE SUN without a proper solar filter or eclipse-rated eyewear.

Vincent van Gogh. (Dutch, 1853-1890). The Starry Night. Saint Rémy, June 1889. Oil on canvas, 29 x 36 1/4" (73.7 x 92.1 cm). On display at the Museum of Modern Art, New York City

I’m starting to dig through the archives here at Silver Rockets, as I’m discovering that a lot of my favorite things were posted toward the beginning when nobody was reading this blog. I’ll be starting a series of highlights and best-ofs, every so often, to bring some happy images back to the surface for your enjoyment.

First up is The Starry Night, one of my favorite paintings PERIOD. This was post #4 here, on July 4, 2006. (Long time, no see!) It was also my first masthead.

It came to mind the other day, while I was remembering this:

Danielle visits Starry Night! June 2011, NYC.

I saw a lot of neat things while I was in New York City last June (most of them sparkly, not spacey), but there are a few specific things that are especially vivid memories, and this is one of them. I could have sat and looked at The Starry Night for an hour, I bet. The colors are vibrant. The texture is incredible. It’s smaller than I’d imagined. Funny how that works. The Starry Night is smallish. The Lady of Shalott is GIGANTIC. Go figure.

I buzzed around MoMA briefly, taking in a roomful of Monet’s water lilies, Art Nouveau furniture and more, but kept gravitating back to the Starry Night room. I could hardly take my eyes off it! I firmly believe that art is best experienced in person, if possible. Even the best reproductions can’t capture that feeling. If you’re able to, I highly recommend paying Starry Night a visit! And don’t be afraid to get close! I got about a foot away, before getting the Eyeball from a guard. Beware the Eyeball.

Apollo 8 Coming Home, by Robert T. McCall, 1969, oil on canvas. Courtesy of the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum.

This is one of my favorite Robert McCall paintings of the space program. The beautiful texture of the Moon, combined with the vibrant colors of the Apollo 8 capsule is just magnificent.

Human eyes directly observed the far side of the Moon for the first time on Christmas Eve 1968. Robert McCall imagines the sight of the rocket engine firing to propel the spacecraft out of lunar orbit for its return to Earth.

This work is on display at the National Air and Space Museum’s Mall building from May 28 to Oct. 9, 2011, as part of the NASA | Art: 50 Years of Exploration exhibition.
Copyright: Smithsonian Institution

A Night Journey, © Atilla Hejja

While at Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex one afternoon, a friend and I happened upon an exhibit of NASA-commissioned space art. I happily snapped reference photos of everything I liked, in order to post as many of them as possible here for your enjoyment! A Night Journey is one of my favorites, and you can order the lithograph from KSCVC. A gorgeous piece!!

International Space Station © Lucy West

A friend on Twitter posted a link to the lovely space artwork of Lucy West — these are my two favorites! Hope everyone had a nice Valentine’s Day (and if not, that you happily binged on chocolate), and remember: the Moon loves you.

Shines The Nameless (2009) © Lucy West

Image © Dacio, thecosmosgallery.com

This lovely oil painting of the Helix Nebula is one of several available as giclée prints. (Found via Facebook. This is one of those rare occasions where an ad on FACEBOOK of all places is not only relevant to me, but actually interesting! Who knew?)

Outer Boundaries © Jeff Ward

I’m always keen to find new space artists to feature here, and today’s discovery is the talented Jeff Ward. His work spans science fiction, fantasy and space/astronomical, and it’s all definitely worth a look!

Among the Outer Ring © Jeff Ward

I think this one here is my favorite ↓

Spiral Galaxy © Jeff Ward

Labyrinth, copyright Tsuneo Sanda

As I frequently apologize for mention, I try not to overwhelm this blog with my fandom of choice, but some things are too beautiful to let them pass me by. (Via DBSW.)

The Meteor of 1860 by Frederic Church. Courtesy: Judith Filenbaum Hernstadt (painting photographed by Gerald L. Carr)

Yesterday’s APOD featured a painting and poem that documented a fireball event in 1860. The Meteor of 1860 by Frederic Church is a beautiful work of art, and dovetails nicely with this snippet of Walt Whitman’s Year of Meteors:

…the strange huge meteor procession, dazzling and clear, shooting over our heads,
(A moment, a moment long, it sail’d its balls of unearthly light over our heads,
Then departed, dropt in the night, and was gone;)

Here’s the story of how these two works were connected to the cosmic phenomenon, and eachother:

Frederic Church (1826-1900), American landscape painter of the Hudson River School, painted what he saw in nature. And on July 20th, 1860, he saw a spectacular string of fireball meteors cross the Catskill evening sky, an extremely rare Earth-grazing meteor procession. From New York City, poet Walt Whitman (1819-1892) also wrote of the “… strange huge meteor procession, dazzling and clear, shooting over our heads” in his poem Year of Meteors (1859-60). But the inspiration for Whitman’s words was forgotten. His astronomical reference became a mystery, the subject of scholarly debate until Texas State University physicists Donald Olson and Russell Doescher, English professor Marilynn Olson, and Honors Program student Ava Pope, located reports documenting the date and timing of the spectacular meteor procession. The breakthrough was spotting the connection with Church’s relatively little-known painting. Fittingly, the forensic astronomy team’s work was just published, on the 150th anniversary of the cosmic event that inspired both poet and painter.

“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

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