Nicole Six and Paul Petritsch
The Sea Of Tranquility
18 June–14 September 2014
Opening: 17 June, 19h
Upper Austrian State Museum
Landesgalerie Linz
Museumstraße 14
4010 Linz
Austria
T +43 (0) 732 / 77 44 82
galerie [at] landesmuseum.at
The mathematician and astronomer Johannes Kepler wrote the imaginative tale Somnium sive astronomia lunaris (The Dream or: Lunar Astronomy) in 1609, a few years before he moved to Linz. In this short work, he imagines a voyage to the moon and gives the first extensive description of everything such a trip would involve and require. He goes on to provide a highly detailed account of the geography and the conditions for life on the moon.
An especially fascinating aspect of this “dream” story is the skillful interweaving of scientific fact with poetic and fantasy elements. Although written long before the existence of science fiction literature as such, it has much in common with the genre and is regarded as one of its forerunners. Science fiction is full of narratives about the conquest of the moon by humans from Jules Verne’s From Earth to the Moon (1865) through Konstantin Tsiolkovski’s rocketry vision First on the Moon (1893) and Fritz Lang’s Woman in the Moon (1929) down to Stanley Kubrick’s Space Odyssey (1968); this continued until the moment fiction became a reality with the space technology of the 20th century.
Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin were the first people to set foot on the Moon during the Apollo 11 mission on 21 July 1969. This historic event marked a victory in the “space race” during the Cold War. The worldwide live television transmission of the Moon landing made it into one of the most significant collective experiences of the 20th century.
Nicole Six and Paul Petritsch are bringing the traces of the Apollo 11 Mission to Earth in full 1:1 scale with their project The Sea of Tranquility.
They are also using the exhibition in the Landesgalerie Linz to present astronomical and everyday objects that left their mark on the mind and dreams of Johannes Kepler during his work in the City of Linz, items which are now preserved in the collection of the Upper Austrian Provincial Museum. The first tracks left by humanity beyond Planet Earth will also be presented by the two artists and contrasted with a selection of their work.
