Outer Space and Popular Culture: Influences and Interrelations, Part 2 (Southern Space Studies) 3030917851, 9783030917852

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Southern Space Studies Series Editor: Annette Froehlich

Annette Froehlich   Editor

Outer Space and Popular Culture Influences and Interrelations, Part 2

Southern Space Studies Series Editor Annette Froehlich

, University of Cape Town, Rondebosch, South Africa

Associate Editor Dirk Heinzmann, Bundeswehr Command and Staff College, Hamburg, Germany Advisory Editors Josef Aschbacher, European Space Agency, Paris, France Rigobert Bayala, National Observatory of Sustainable Development, Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso Carlos Caballero León, Peruvian Space Agency, Lima, Peru Guy Consolmagno, Vatican Observatory, Castel Gandolfo, Vatican City State Juan de Dalmau, International Space University, Illkirch-Graffenstaden, France Driss El Hadani, Royal Center for Remote Sensing of Morocco, Rabat, Morocco El Hadi Gashut, Regional Center For Remote Sensing of North Africa States, Tunis, Tunisia Michelle Hanlon, For All Moonkind, New Canaan, CT, USA Félix Clementino Menicocci, Argentinean Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Buenos Aires, Argentina Sias Mostert, African Association of Remote Sensing of the Environment, Muizenburg, South Africa Val Munsami, South African National Space Agency, Silverton, South Africa Greg Olsen, Entrepreneur-Astronaut, Princeton, NJ, USA Azzedine Oussedik, Algerian Space Agency, Alger, Algeria Xavier Pasco, Fondation pour la Recherche Stratégique, Paris, France Elvira Prado Alegre, Ibero-American Institute of Air and Space Law and Commercial Aviation, Madrid, Spain Alejandro J. Román M., Paraguayan Space Agency, Asunción, Paraguay Fermín Romero Vázquez, Fundacion Acercandote al Universo, Mexico City, Mexico Kai-Uwe Schrogl, International Institute of Space Law, Paris, France Dominique Tilmans, YouSpace, Wellin, Belgium Jean-Jacques Tortora, European Space Policy Institute, Vienna, Austria Robert van Zyl, Cape Peninsula University of Technology, Bellville, South Africa

The Southern Space Studies series presents analyses of space trends, market evolutions, policies, strategies and regulations, as well as the related social, economic and political challenges of space-related activities in the Global South, with a particular focus on developing countries in Africa and Latin America. Obtaining inside information from emerging space-faring countries in these regions is pivotal to establish and strengthen efficient and beneficial cooperation mechanisms in the space arena, and to gain a deeper understanding of their rapidly evolving space activities. To this end, the series provides transdisciplinary information for a fruitful development of space activities in relevant countries and cooperation with established space-faring nations. It is, therefore, a reference compilation for space activities in these areas. The volumes of the series are peer-reviewed.

More information about this series at https://link.springer.com/bookseries/16025

Annette Froehlich Editor

Outer Space and Popular Culture Influences and Interrelations, Part 2

Editor Annette Froehlich SpaceLab University of Cape Town Rondebosch, South Africa

ISSN 2523-3718 ISSN 2523-3726 (electronic) Southern Space Studies ISBN 978-3-030-91785-2 ISBN 978-3-030-91786-9 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-91786-9 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

Contents

1 Being the Alien: The Space Pierrots and Circus Spaces of David Bowie, Klaus Nomi and Michael Jackson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Anna-Sophie Jürgens

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2 When Art Was Science . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Barbara Amelia King

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3 The Limitless Horizons of Space Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Barbara Amelia King

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4 Rockets and Science Fiction: A Mutual Journey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Christoffel Kotze

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Being the Alien: The Space Pierrots and Circus Spaces of David Bowie, Klaus Nomi and Michael Jackson Anna-Sophie Jürgens

ABSTRACT

Some particular popular and culturally influential manifestations of circusrelated performing bodies in alien costumes emerged on Earth during the peak of the Space Age and thereafter, i.e. between the 1970s and 1990s. They include the out-of-this-world stage personae created by David Bowie, Klaus Nomi and Michael Jackson. In their performances, these icons of popular music reformulated their bodies through costumes that invoked both circus and the alien as a model for a subject that is tolerant of alterity. Each of them conjured up a unique aesthetic that blends clown iconography and circus world references, space imaginary and artistic expression. Exploring selected video clips and short films, this chapter examines both the visual means—visual fictions—through which the three artists assert their personae as well as the cultural legacy they have left for subsequent generations. A “Circus from another Planet” has recently taken over the Great Moscow State Circus. Featuring laser shows, neon lights, high-tech special effects and gravity defying stunts, the show UFO presents an alien encounter of the circus kind.1 Fuelled by electro and techno music, performers in otherworldly costumes explore the idea of space travel and alien invasion, futuristic robotics and the abstract physicality of the extraterrestrial. The fantasies of fantabulous creatures from outer space staged in this show blend with the cultural imaginary of circus bodies: both draw on and refer to a domain of bodies and physicalities that exploits ideas of

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See “Out of this world: Moscow State Circus puts on alien show”, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=LGXd4lUILxI and “Circus show ‘UFO’”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odMbVxPs6w (the show premiered in 2014; accessed 4 April 2020).

A.-S. Jürgens (B) Australian National University, Canberra, Australia e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 A. Froehlich (ed.), Outer Space and Popular Culture, Southern Space Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-91786-9_1

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the out-of-the-ordinary, of extraordinariness;2 both circus and alien bodies are transcendent forms of the Other. This chapter examines the interplay of these bodies and the cultural identities they (re)present and create—of performing bodies that encompass and evoke circus and outer space. As the companion piece to “Clowns in Space: An Introduction to Circus Aliens and Spaced-out Comic Performers” (published in part one of the “Outer Space and Popular Culture” series of Southern Space Studies),3 which discusses the larger transmedial narrative context of circus-space and space-circus fictions, this chapter zooms in on some particularly popular and culturally influential manifestations of circus-related performing bodies in alien costumes. The focus is on the landmark alien protagonists and images of space created by David Bowie, Klaus Nomi and Michael Jackson between the 1970s and 1990s, a period that coincides with the peak of the Space Age and the years thereafter. These three icons of popular music reformulated their bodies through costumes that invoked both circus and the alien as a model for a subject that is tolerant of alterity. In their spaced-out stage personae,4 each of them conjured up a unique aesthetic that blends clown iconography and/or circus world references, space imaginary and artistic expression. This chapter examines the visual means—visual fictions—through which they assert these personae. One central question examined in the following pages is which circus, clown and space aspects are referred to in particular. Which stage identities are constructed at their intersections? If “[t]he cultural fascination with circus reveals a social orientation to watching bodies doing physical action”,5 what do performing bodies reveal that evoke circus phenomena but do not perform any physical circus action, exploiting instead notions of circus world imaginary and extraterrestriality primarily through make-up style and sartorial expression? Readers who have lived on a steady musical diet of pop and (glam) rock, or expect a cornucopia of never-seen inside clues for forensic Bowie fans, will be disappointed. This chapter offers no in-depth exegesis of song texts or musical styles, but a discussion of space and circus associations in the visual fictions unfolding in selected performances (music videos and films) of Bowie, Nomi and Jackson. The discussion is neither intended to be exhaustive, nor does it provide the ultimate history of stylistic cross-influences. Rather, drawing on previous theoretical work on these performers and popular entertainment, cultural commentary and statements by the artists themselves, this chapter illustrates the scope of the phenomenon—of how pop cultural icons draw inspiration from and add to the rich cultural legacy around clown and outer space phenomena. Bowie, Nomi and Jackson represent

2 Cf. Peta Tait, Circus Bodies: Cultural identity in aerial performance (New York: Routledge, 2005), 138. 3 Anna-Sophie Jürgens, “Clowns in Space: An Introduction to Circus Aliens and Spaced-out Comic Performers”, in Southern Space Studies: “Outer Space and Popular Culture”, ed. Annette Froehlich (Cham: Springer, 2020), 71–89. 4 Philip Auslander, Performing Glam Rock: Gender and Theatricality in popular music (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2006), 4–5. 5 Tait, Circus Bodies, 140.

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identity-blurring stars and self-created artworks embodying sartorial splendour, thus pushing the boundaries of theatricality. This chapter suggests that the discussion about their alien costumes contributes to revealing a novel way of looking at both circus and space oddities in popular culture, in particular ‘glamorous’ aspects of space. Space and alien themes played a dominant role within the popular music of the late last century: within the 1950s rock’n’roll rebellion, rock’s history, and, particularly after the 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing in spaced-out space-age chic, in glam and glitter rock. Glam found its most iconic expression in sartorial excess— in absurd silver foil costumes, flamboyant skin-tight jumpsuits and extravagant platform boots; in (cheaply fabricated) vinyl, glitter, sequins, feather boas, and rhinestone make-up—and through popular music. Incarnated in the fictitious alteregos created by music stars and their theatrical extravaganza, glam was “a peculiar peacock restaging of the baroque ornamentation of show-business mixed with the downbeat nihilism of the early 1970s”.6 Across national boundaries, reformed hippies and proto-punks7 got high on a magic potion of dystopian futurity, the cheap charm of decorative mannerism, of rock’n’roll, androgynity and gender-bending, spectacle and theatricality,8 kitsch and frivolity. Space and space alien themes were associated with drug-induced out-of-this-world experiences,9 political and sexual liberation and one unicum in particular: David Bowie’s alter-ego Ziggy Stardust, that “Martian messiah who twanged a guitar”.10

1.1

David Bowie: Lost in Clown Space?

David Bowie (1947–2016) forms a link that not only connects Andy Warhol, Bertolt Brecht, Marlene Dietrich and Kansai Yamamoto,11 but also clowns, excursions into space and an enthusiasm for everything galactic. His exploration of

6 Neil Mulholland, “Bang the Whole Gang”, in Glam: The Performance of Style, ed. Darren Pih (Liverpool: Tate Liverpool, 2013), 83–93, here 84. For a discussion of the terms “glitter” and “glam” see Glenn O’Brien, “The Birth of Glitter Rock”, in Pih, Glam, 123–132. For an overview of the historical context, with a focus on the development of space science and technology, see Ken McLeod, “Space oddities: aliens, futurism and meaning in popular music”, Popular Music 22, no. 3 (2003), 315–333, here 339–340. 7 Dominic Johnson, “Crocodile Tears: A counter-archive of Glam Aesthetics”, in Pih, Glam, 95– 107, here 95. 8 It is thus fitting that one of the most contemporary clown incarnations swings to a Garry Glitter song in his first film appearance in full make-up (see Anna-Sophie Jürgens, “The Pathology of Joker’s Dance: On the Origins of Arthur Fleck’s Body Aesthetics in Todd Phillips’s 2019 Joker Film”, Dance Chronicle 43/3, 321–337. 9 Geoffrey Marsh, “Astronaut of inner spaces: Sundridge Park, Soho, London… Mars”, Victoria Broackes and Geoffrey Marsh (Eds.), David Bowie is (London: V&A Publishing, 2013), 27–46, here 35. 10 Bowie in McLeod, “Space oddities, 341. 11 Among others, see Broackes/Marsh, David Bowie is, 19 (preface).

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the defamiliarising experience of outer space, an against-the-grain interpretation of space travel, his adventures as “glam-rock alien transvestite Ziggy Stardust”12 and other sci-fi Pierrot embodiments, stimulated by post-modern irony and theatricality, put an end to both the flower power movement and hippie earthiness. However, at the same time, Bowie’s interest in space themes also grew against the backdrop of a larger cultural context of the 1960s scrutinising the self and new forms of perception. ‘Inner space’ was examined in the famous NASA-sponsored experiment with Whilden P. Breen, Jr., who in 1963 spent five months in a windowless, soundproof isolation chamber for a study of the psychological effects of isolation and human behaviour in confinement. At that time, writers, including William Burroughs, referred to themselves as explorers and cosmonauts of inner space; and Andy Warhol—another influence on Bowie, whom Bowie played in Julian Schnabel’s 1996 film Basquiat—made an influential video in 1965 entitled Outer and Inner Space.13 Inspired by Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey and the plight of the Apollo 8 astronauts, Bowie describes the rocket launch of the fictional astronaut Major Tom and his emotional loneliness in outer and inner space in his 1969 space ballad “Space Oddity”. Building on this fascination with the interstellar and galactic, three years later—in his 1972 album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars—Bowie morphs into a bi-sexual alien rock superstar who turns into a victim of his own success, and ultimately commits rock’n’roll suicide. It is interesting to note that, on the 1972 Ziggy Stardust tour, talking to rock journalist Charles Murray, Bowie defined the Ziggy figure as a mask and expected that it would take him a few months to get “entirely out of [his] system, and then [he]’ll don another mask”.14 Bowie did indeed soon appear in another alien mask: that of Thomas Jerome Newton in Nicolas Roeg’s 1976 scifi film The Man Who Fell to Earth, a humanoid from a distant planet experiencing a catastrophic drought, who comes to Earth to take water back to his home, where his family is waiting. When not wearing his human disguise and playing human(s),15 Thomas looks like a hair- and sexless nude reptile. “The genius of casting Bowie”, Mark Kermode has remarked, “was that he didn’t appear to be acting at all. In fact, the one moment in the film when it doesn’t ring true is when they stick him in the

12

Alexander Carpenter, “‘Give a man a mask and he’ll tell the truth’: Arnold Schoenberg, David Bowie, and the mask of Pierrot”, Intersections 30, no.2 (2010), 5–24, here 16. See also: “In suggesting that Ziggy Stardust was an extraterrestrial, Bowie borrowed a trope from psychedelic rock only to reverse its ideological polarity.” Because of the many references to space, space travel and aliens in psychedelic rock, “space rock” is sometimes called a rock subgenre (Auslander, Performing Glam Rock, 126). 13 Marsh, “Astronaut of inner spaces”, 35. See Tom Flaherty, “Long Voyage in Inner Space”, LIFE (17 Mai 1963), 119–120. See also Craig Copetas, “Beat Godfather Meets Glitter Mainman: William Burroughs Interviews David Bowie”, Rolling Stone (28 February 1974), https://www. rollingstone.com/music/music-news/beat-godfather-meets-glitter-mainman-william-burroughs-int erviews-david-bowie-92508/ (accessed 12 April 2020). 14 Carpenter, “Give a man a mask and he’ll tell the truth”, 16. 15 On the aliens-playing-human(s) trope see Jürgens, “Clowns in Space”, 85–87.

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space-lizard make-up. Then he just looks like a bloke in space-lizard make-up.”16 Perceived as a ‘naturally born alien’, it is not surprising that Bowie took up the subject of space again on several occasions. In his 1980 song “Ashes to Ashes”, for example, Bowie unveils the space trip of the existential ‘hero’ Major Tom in his “tin can” as a junkie’s drug trip. He also evokes outer space in other songs, including but not limited to his 1990 album Loving the Alien, the 1995 song “Hallo Spaceboy”, and “Blackstar” (2016). Multiple studies are dedicated to the analysis of these songs and Bowie’s alien appearance, in particular in terms of ‘sexual alienation’ (‘the alien’ as a metaphor for his own sexual alienation), the mélange of gender and gender-bending.17 These phenomena have been sufficiently analysed not to warrant lingering on them even further, except to point out that they also belong to the sparks set off by the friction, or interplay, between the alien, mask and clown themes. Bowie’s signature style was eclecticism, fuelled by juxtaposition and syncretism; a “synthesizing” (in his own words) of different styles and also performing genres “combining music hall, vaudeville, pantomime, movies, musical comedy, cabaret, theatre of cruelty, modern dance, French chanson and American blues, folks, rock and soul”.18 The alien personae staged and performed by Bowie also intertwine with clowning and miming, clown figures and references. And the latter are far more sophisticated than the gigantic clown balloon Thomas Jerome Newton (aka Bowie) looks at with disgust on the way into the first human city he visits after falling to Earth in Roeg’s movie. Bowie was introduced to miming, acting and the power of physical expression, of camp make-up, costume and set, by the actor and mime Lindsay Kemp. Kemp was a hedonist, clown, mystic (and a former ballet dancer, stripper and chorus boy). He was totally committed to art and lived life as a performance. In 1967, before meeting Bowie in person and becoming his mentor (and lover), Kemp was using Bowie’s music during intermissions in a show entitled Clowns Hour at the Little Theatre.19 “What I want to do”, Kemp explained about his work (in general), “is to restore to the theatre the glamour of the Folies Bergère, the danger of the circus, the sexuality of rock’n’roll, and the ritual of Death.”20 It is thus not surprising that Bowie called Kemp “a living Pierrot”, and clarified: “He lived and talked Pierrot. He was tragic and everything in his life was theatrical. And so the stage thing for him was just an extension of himself.”21

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Kermode in Christopher Frayling, Philip Hoare & Mark Kermode: “David Bowie then… David Bowie Now…”, in Broackes/Marsh, David Bowie is, 283–303, here 285. 17 See e.g. Carpenter, “Give a man a mask and he’ll tell the truth”, 16 (footnote). 18 Camille Paglia, “Theatre of Gender: David Bowie at the Climax of the Sexual Revolution”, in Broackes/Marsh, David Bowie is, 68–92, here 84. 19 Marsh, “Astronaut of inner spaces”, footnote on page 310. 20 Kemp in David Haughton, “Between Worlds” in Lindsay Kemp and Company, ed. Anno Wilms (Berlin: Alexander Verlag, 1987), 9–18, here 11. 21 Marsh, “Astronaut of inner spaces”, 38 (quoted from Kevin Cann, Any Day Now: David Bowie, The London Years: 1947–1974 (London: Adelita, 2010), 112).

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Kemp features in the video of Bowie’s 1972 song “John, I’m Only Dancing”,22 and was also both director and performer in Bowie’s 1972 Rainbow Theatre Ziggy Stardust concerts, thus influencing the development of popular music performance. Inspired by the theatrical training of his inspirational teacher—Kemp called his mentee “a genius of a creature, but he [Kemp] did show him how to do it”23 — Bowie recurrently refers to clown characters in his works, and particularly to that of the white clown or Pierrot. Historically, the figure of Pierrot emerged from the tradition of the Commedia dell’arte, in which he was a servant usually treated as a mere laughing stock. The figure went through countless metamorphoses, to finally become one of the most important cultural myths of the late nineteenth century. According to Christiane Mühlegger, Pierrot became a productive artistic archetype because he had no actual history, no development, no fixed age, no identity.24 He was thus an ideal projection surface for poets, writers and artists of the last decades of the 1800s (including Théodore de Banville, Théophile Gautier and many others), personifying their own states of mind, the existence and sensitivity of the artists. Pierrot was symptomatic of the fin de siècle. He became a psychologically profound, extremely complex and genuinely ambivalent figure: androgynous and erotically confused, or simply impotent and genderless, he appears as a melancholic trapped in a hostile and purposeless universe; a loser and outsider in society in search of an alternative existence to bourgeois reality; and a symbol for the suffering human creature defeated from within and without. Thus, while for the French poet Paul Verlaine, for instance, the white-as-if-bloodless Pierrot is a moribund symbol of death, in the graphic works of (e.g. in the illustrations for Oscar Wilde’s Salome) he is a sexually nondescript, androgynous prop of decadent and sultry genius. Yet Pierrot also manifested as a cosmic degenerate: a sociopath and sadistic neurotic addicted to the mal du siècle, the ennui and spleen.25 Remarkably, this ambivalent protagonist, which represents so many different aspects of human existence, has one striking feature: an affinity and attachment to the moon. In his most famous incarnations—including Arnold Schönberg’s most celebrated melodrama Pierrot Lunaire (1912)—Pierrot is literally moonstruck: intoxicated by the moon. He carries, for instance, a ray of moon light under his mask (in Giraud’s poems, interpreted in Schönberg’s piece).26 The moonlight also plays a decorative role in Pierrot contexts, and evokes notions of fading vitality: Pierrot’s “white

22 “David Bowie: John, I’m Only Dancing (Official Video)”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= lmVVyhpuFRc (accessed 13 April 2020). 23 Cf. Alex Marshall, “Lindsay Kemp, Dancer Who Taught David Bowie, Is Dead at 80”, New York Times (29 August 2018), https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/29/obituaries/lindsay-kempdead.html (accessed 12 April 2020). 24 Christiane Mühlegger, ‘Pierrot s’agite et tout le mène’ – Metamorphosen einer Lachfigur—Jules Laforgue und die Pierrotfigur im Zeichen der Philosophie des Unbewussten Eduard von Hartmanns (Frankfurt a.M.: Peter Lang 2000). 25 On stage, this incarnation of the Pierrot character did not merely send shivers down the spines of those who watched him, but it also made them laugh, cf. e.g. Anna-Sophie Jürgens, “A Funny Taste: Clowns and Cannibals”, Comedy Studies 9, no. 2 (2018), 171–182. 26 Cf. Giraud in Carpenter, “Give a man a mask and he’ll tell the truth”, 8.

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appearance corresponds with coldness, infertility, the similar figure of Narcissus, the aloofness of the dandy as well as the iciness of the snow”.27 In line with this iconography, the intrinsically ambivalent Pierrot figure, who is genuinely related to outer space, appears in a sketch Bowie provided for the back cover of Space Oddity and stars in Kemp’s pantomime Pierrot in Turquoise (1967, filmed for Scottish television), in which Bowie played a part. Bowie-as-Pierrot is shown in full make-up, shadowed by a Pierrot doppelganger, on the cover of his 1980 album Scary Monsters, which includes the abovementioned song “Ashes to Ashes”. In the “Ashes to Ashes” video, another nonlinear narrative conveying the feeling of being mentally lost and physically trapped (like in “Space Oddity”), Bowie is “a sci-fi Pierrot, who is lost in an inner if not an outer space”.28 Dressed in a rather traditional Pierrot costume, which has been defined as a reproduction of a Lindsay Kemp outfit designed by Natasha Korniloff,29 Bowie walks around in an unearthly—‘lunar’?—landscape, before he is apparently pushed into the sea by a bulldozer. Traditionally, a cipher for artistic existence, indefinability and cosmic longing, the Pierrot corresponds to the other two interconnected protagonists in the video, whose mental and physical atrophy he echoes: a person trapped within a padded cell, probably of an asylum, and a low-tech, defeated astronaut hooked into a spider web of metal tubes and industrial hoses (a theme we will come back to later). They all look like victims of a grand cosmic prank. The traditional outfit of Bowie’s Pierrot perfectly matches the non-progressive futuristic depiction of the astronaut (see below for what progressive space travellers can look like), and is also analogous to the mask of the alien discussed above: both embody questionable identities; the subversion and negation of ‘authentic’ identity.30 Pierrot is thus not just a costume, but a medium to convey the alienness of the performer at the intersection between art and life. Bowie’s statement about pop music underlines this perspective: “I think it [music] should be tarted up, made into a prostitute, a parody of itself. It should be the clown, the Pierrot medium. The music is the mask the message wears—music is the Pierrot and I, the performer, am the message”.31 Read à la Marshall McLuhan, the nature of Pierrot (the medium) which is the channel through which a message (in this case the performer) is transmitted is more important than what the message has to say. As Carpenter has pointed out, the Pierrot-theme serves Bowie as a requiem for earlier incarnations (including Ziggy) and as a means “to establish a foothold in the future, namely the burgeoning new wave/new romantic aesthetic of the early 1980s, from which he would be launched into international superstardom.32

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Mühlegger, “Pierrot s’agite et tout le mène”, 87 (transl. ASJ). Shelton Waldrep, Future Nostalgia: Performing David Bowie (New York: Bloomsbury, 2016), 91. 29 Victoria Broackes, “Putting out fire with gasoline: Designing David Bowie”, in Broackes/Marsh, David Bowie is, 116–163, here 136. 30 Alien imaginary “differs” the notion of “authentic” identity, see McLeod “Space oddities”, 339. 31 Bowie in Carpenter, “Give a man a mask and he’ll tell the truth”, 17. 32 Carpenter, “Give a man a mask and he’ll tell the truth”, 5. 28

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The idea of transforming into “a space boy or a space girl” and a Pierrot turned out to be “a workable fantasy”,33 not only for Bowie. It was also used by another performer, who in a different way fused the iconography of Pierrot with the alien.

1.2

Singing Astral Pop Songs for Earthlings: Klaus Nomi, the Futuristic RoboPierrot

A contemporary of David Bowie, the counter-tenor Klaus Nomi (1944–1983) was considered to come from another planet. And this is very much the way he thought of himself: he said about himself that he came from outer space. Reviewers called him an “asexual creature, a sad clown with the physique of an alien in love with Callas and Elvis Presley”, a “futuristic clown” and a “singing mutant”.34 Nomi embodies “perhaps the most outrageous use of alien identity in the annals of rock music”.35 In his out-of-this-world falsetto, he sang opera and rock’n’roll, and has been ranked among the most glittering stars of glam36 and new wave artists. Before moving to New York from Germany in 1972, Nomi (alias Klaus Sperber) worked as an usher at the Deutsche Oper Berlin, and entertained his colleagues with renditions of great arias and imitations of Presley and Callas.37 In New York, he appeared with Charles Ludlam’s Ridiculous Theater Company in a comic camp reworking of Richard Wagner’s Das Rheingold (he played the Rheinmaiden and the Wood Bird),38 performed in various clubs and new wave vaudeville shows, and received international attention with a TV appearance in 1979—when he and his friend and colleague Joey Arias performed as background singers of David Bowie on Saturday Night Live. The performance has been described as “one of the best and strangest moments in the late-night variety show’s three-and-a-half-decade run”.39 Inspired by Bowie, but taking the aestheticisation of (alien) life to another level, Nomi introduced himself to his friends as a robot-puppet from outer space and created what has been called a kind of secret society of ‘Nomis’, aka fellow extraterrestrials. In his cabaret style performances with their Kabuki-meetsBauhaus setting, he consequently pursed the idea of being a space alien from a glamorous galaxy dropped down to earth to sing “earth-pop”.40 His visual

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Jon Savage, “Oh! You pretty things”, in Broackes/Marsh, David Bowie is, 98–110, here 107. Andrew Horn (director), The Nomi Song, DVD, 2005, 1:05:38 (press reviews, original in French). 35 McLeod, “Space oddities”, 348. 36 O’Brien, “The Birth of Glitter Rock”, 129. 37 Ken McLeod, “Bohemian rhapsodies: operatic influences on rock music”, Popular Music 20, no. 2 (2001), 189–203, here 197. 38 Ludlam in David Kaufman, Ridiculous! The Theatrical Life and Times of Charles Ludlam (New York: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2002), 263. Thanks to Sean Edgecomb for pointing out this source. 39 Marc Spitz, Bowie: A Biography (New York: Crown Publishers, 2009), 300. 40 McLeod, “Bohemian rhapsodies”, 197. 34

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appearance corresponded to this narrative and gave the Pierrot iconography a new twist: Nomi was slight and balding but worked that into his otherworldly appearance as well. The pointy black hair on either side of his skull was waxed into sharp triangles. A phallic clump of it, rounded at the end, protruded from the top of his elfin skull like a single antenna. Nomi’s stare was blank but his expression was wry. His lips were painted black and bee stung. His cheeks were deathly white. Klaus Nomi looked like Felix the Cat’s demented German Cousin.41

Nomi injected a huge dose of camp into the discourse around extraterrestrial performance on stage, without parodying or negating either opera or rock traditions.42 In contrast to Bowie’s existential Pierrot, Nomi’s visual take on the Pierrot figure recasts the carnival spirit shimmering through this Commedia dell’arte protagonist. “Pantomime and circus, clowns and pierrots, have a crucial role to play in this continuity”, Louise Jones has shown by referring to Mikhail Bakhtin, “who describes clowns and fools as ‘the constant, accredited representatives of the carnival spirit in everyday life out of the carnival season.’”43 The carnival spirit, Jones continues, manifests in the Commedia among other things in the confusion of identities and mixed roles: performers (such as fools and jesters) were known by their stage identities off stage, they lived on what Bakhtin calls a “borderline between life and art”.44 Nomi’s alien futuristic Pierrot can also be located there—a persona he, surrounded by Nomis, extended to off-stages spheres. Nomi’s stage persona (he developed just one) is not merely reminiscent of a scifi Pierrot and a demented version of a cartoon character from the silent film era, but also referred to and played with the aesthetics of robots. In his performances, he did not only feature backup dancers who looked like robot mummies from another planet, and used imaginary automatons and robots in his videos, but he also mimicked robots or futuristic mannequins on stage.45 His alien soprano and glossy black-and-white signature spacesuit-carapace of a tuxedo were complemented by pointy, angular, stiff, machine-like movements. This connection has obviously not gone unnoticed, which is why in 1982 Nomi appeared on TV together with the inventors of robot pop—the electro music band Kraftwerk, of whose 1976 album

41

Spitz, Bowie, 300–301. For Nomi’s musical style and camp aesthetics/discourse, see McLeod, “Bohemian rhapsodies”, 198. 43 Louisa E. Jones, Sad clowns and pale Pierrots: Literature and the popular comic arts in nineteenth century France (Lexington: French Forum, 1984), 15. For more details on Bakhtin in circus/clown contexts see Jürgens, “Clowns in Space”, 73–74. 44 Jones, Sad clowns and pale Pierrots, 17. 45 The Nomi Song, 16:17 (“mummies from outer space”), 18:44 (Nomi creating and meeting Nomis) and 1:04:04 (robot Nomi). See also his movements in his futuristic synth-pop hit “Total Eclipse” (from the 1981 Klaus Nomi album): “Klaus Nomi: Total Eclipse 1981 Live Video”, https:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmLk2vSXXtk (accessed 13 April 2020). 42

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Radio-Activity David Bowie was a fan.46 The visual magnetism of Bowie, whom Nomi revered (and for whom Nomi was an inspiration), has been linked to the way he brought together art and gender in his adaptation of the mannequin style.47 ‘Mannequin style’ this is also how the style of Nomi can be called. In fact, when Nomi appeared in New York (in the early 1970s), “smooth creatures with illdefined features and egg-shaped heads” turned up in shop windows: they were the first futuristic, abstract mannequins produced by Gemini Mannequins, which looked “like creatures from outer space”.48 Nomi must have been well aware of these developments as his friend Joey Arias worked for the Fiorucci boutique in New York, which during the 1970s created infamous live windows with dolllooking models that staged bizarre deadpan plays (in which they were chained to the ceiling, for instance).49 In the 1980s, experiments with robotically moving mannequins became popular, in particular after the introduction of Steren Robotics to the display industry.50 Besides mechanical figures (resembling automata), robot mannequins appeared in shop windows in the form of live models pretending to be mechanical mannequins (like Nomi holding a pose for a while, freezing in positions, etc.). They attracted the attention of passer-bys by an intricate play of layered imitations that raise questions such as: Who is the model, the stylization of the body, the robot and the human? Nomi’s robot Pierrot raises similar multilayered questions about what he actually staged, and what his stage persona represented: a robotic space mannequin imitating a human, a humanoid machine simulator, a robot costume ‘inhabited’ by an alien, a comic robot ‘hide-out’ or a white clown robot (as) disguise? It is from an angle that differs from Bowie’s alien alter-egos that Nomi’s stage persona participates in the ‘white clown space discourse’: he echoes transmedial sci-fi narratives around humans appearing to be (alien) robots and robotic-moving (wannabe) aliens in human disguise. These narrative tropes were already explored, for instance, in the 1935 Western-sci-fi-film Phantom Empire (in chapter ten: The Rebellion) in which hollowed-out robots serve the protagonists as costumes in a comic interlude in the larger futuristic plot about the underground world of the city of Murania. The silly robot costumes shift the roles of the robots from those of techno-menaces “to clumsy vaudevillians, drawing in the audience as collaborators in the comedic routine”.51 Robot disguises, comical to varying degrees, appear in

In the first episode of famous German TV show Na Sowas!, see “Klaus Nomi interview + Total Eclipse on German TV”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZceLGCWwWg (accessed 14 April 2020). 47 Paglia, “Theatre of Gender”, 84. 48 Sara K. Schneider, Vital Mummies: Performance Design for the Show-Window Mannequin (New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 1995), 130. 49 Schneider, Vital Mummies, 1 (the famous 1980 Valentine’s Day window was entitled “Airplane Crash”). 50 Schneider, Vital Mummies, 43. 51 Miller in Jay P. Telotte, “The Empire’s New Robots”, Science Fiction Studies 42, no. 1 (2015), 99–114, here 106. For more examples see Jürgens, “Clowns in Space”. 46

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Woody Allen’s 1973 sci-fi comedy Sleeper; in Paul Verhoeven’s 1990 sci-fi action film Total Recall, in which the protagonist (Arnold Schwarzenegger) hides inside a robot puppet (of a human) in order to pass Mars immigration; in the futuristic circus worlds of Peter Carey’s 1994 novel The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith; and in Tim Burton’s 1996 sci-fi comedy Mars Attacks!. In the post-Nomi era of the late twentieth century, the appropriation and evocation of space, aliens and circus associations also manifest themselves in the works of another star of popular music, whose looks and falsetto voice appear to mimic conventions primarily detected previously in baroque high-register male vocalists (such as Farinelli) or male soul or gospel music: Michael Jackson.

1.3

Out of This World: Michael Jackson, the Male Barbarella?

Bowie rejected the triumph of technology and explored space travel as a journey to isolation, a less-than-stellar enterprise, and a questionable breakthrough for mankind, whether with flamboyant crimson-orange hair or as a space-lizard. Nomi, drawing from and expanding on Bowie’s theatrical lead in space matters, appeared as a fantabulous tame robot pop-castrato who brought comic-dramatical enlightenment to earthlings about futuristic social decay and nuclear destruction (see the lyrics of “Total Eclipse”). Michael Jackson (1958–2009), by contrast, embraced a technology-driven, ‘militaristic’ perspective on space adventures. In his 1988 anthology musical film Moonwalker, for example, he transforms himself first into a gigantic robot—who would have caught even Nomi by surprise—and then into a spaceship, which turns a bad guy to ashes. Robo uniforms, space fight and fast glossy spaceships characterise Jackson’s space adventures. The video of Michael and Janet Jackson’s duet “Scream” (released in 1995) from his ninth studio album (HIStory: Past, Present and Future, Book I) is another example. The video focuses on the Jacksons in the role not of doomed, but bored astronauts travelling first past and then getting away from Earth in a large slick spacecraft (with padded walls). Wearing black latex and shiny silver outfits while singing, they passivelyaggressively float on gravity, break objects and engage in animalistic movements and robotic dancing. “Scream” was the first song (after the intro) that opened most of the concerts of Jackson’s 1996/1997 HIStory world tour; it was presented by Jackson in a gold and silver spacesuit, after he ‘landed’ his spacecraft on stage. The robotic alien is just one of Jackson’s many personae; apart from the “Billie Jean” mime and the gangster “Smooth Criminal”, they also include “Captain EO”. EO is the superhero of the eponymous 1986 3D sci-fi film Captain EO (written by George Lucas and directed by Francis Ford Coppola). Starring Michael Jackson, this is a 17-min space opera about the adventures of a superhuman space adventurer and his alien crew, consisting of a robotic security officer, a doubleheaded three-legged plush navigator and a clumsy elephant-like shipmate (“the

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funniest and hungriest elephant to exploit on the screen since Dumbo”),52 among others. They are on a mission to deliver a gift to The Supreme Leader, a malicious creature attached to twisted metal tubes and steaming vents, which looks like a H.R. Giger fantasy in an industrial wasteland. Not very enthusiastic about the colourful visitors, the techno-minions of the Supreme Leader threaten to subject EO to excessive torture and to turn his team into trash cans. Following extravagant dancing, marching in choreographic formations, crotch shaking and supernatural fighting, EO transforms the Leader’s cybernetic attackers into backup dancers and uses his musical super power to metamorphose the Leader herself into a beautiful woman, highness of a dark techno-hell-turned kitschy paradise.53 Before her transformation, the hissing, disembodied Supreme Leader is a torso with arms ending in metallic jingling bird claws, who hangs spider-like from a cable cocoon and wears a disproportionately large corrugated maggot around her neck (fitting the upper half of her head, which is reminiscent of a Scorpion). She echoes the astronaut in Bowie’s “Ashes to Ashes” music video from 1980, who is fastened to hard-to-define metal and industrial machinery in a cyperpunkish underground lair whose walls are overgrown by organically looking metal tubes that enter his body (a life control machine? a hint to Ridley Scott’s Alien released the year before?). For some, the message of that astronaut is clear: “Bowie is condemning the intrepid spaceman who has failed to bring a promise of hope”.54 In contrast to this apocalyptic vision, Jackson’s techno fetishist version of space ultimately offers an optimistic hazy cosmic jive—cosmic hope. Jackson’s musicvideo-blockbuster-film EO is thus more akin to Roger Vadim’s 1968 sci-fi film Barbarella (starring Jane Fonda; produced by De Laurentiis, who also produced Fellini’s 1954 film La Strada) than it is to Kubrick’s Space Odyssey (which was released during the same year, 1968). Barbarella is a sultry, naïve space traveller fighting for the good (“Why would anybody want to invent a weapon?”), whose extraordinarily stylized outfits inspired many fashion extravaganzas and film costumes thereafter. Her amazingly tight fitting space onesies-cum-boots and metallic leotards connoting futuristic technology had a comeback in the 1990s, an era celebrating the futuristic design of the space age.55 Brimming with references to these aesthetics, Captain EO seems to be a forerunner of the space age design comeback. And, interestingly, the superpower that EO radiates emerges from his

52

Whoopi Goldberg in “The Making Of Captain EO”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLewTYg60I (accessed 16 April 2020). 53 The film was shown at Disney theme parks between 1986 and 1998 (and as a tribute in 2010, after Jackson’s death). Captain EO Full Movie, accessed 8 April 2020, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=ONRTzWy26Ko. 54 Broackes, “Putting out fire with gasoline!, 140. 55 Elizabeth Castaldo Lundén, “Barbarella’s wardrobe: Exploring Jacques Fonteray’s intergalactic runway”, Film, Fashion & Consumption 5, no. 2 (2016), 185–211, here 190, cf. 188. For the link between new material in fashion and space age politics, see 188–189 (cf. Jean-Paul Gautier’s costumes in Luc Besson’s 1997 sci-fi action film The Fifth Element).

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T-shirt, which features a three-colour lightning bolt—perhaps a sartorial version of Bowie’s famous facial lightning strike make-up. At first glance, a comparison between Captain EO and Bowie’s personae may seem surprising. However, both Bowie and Jackson did not only achieve mass fame and hype at roughly the same time, the first one as a self-acclaimed alien rock ‘messiah’ and a sci-fi Pierrot, the other as a space traveller bringing salvation from evil technodom. Their paths also crossed several times and they shared some common interests. They are brought together by a fascination for changing alter egos, masks and metamorphoses, and for phenomena from theatre and popular spectacle, including miming and freak show performance. Although Jackson’s stage protagonists did not include explicit clown or Pierrot interpretations (an exception is his appearance in Sidney Lumet’s 1978 musical fantasy film The Wiz, in which Jackson plays the clown-nosed Scarecrow), the famous mime Marcel Marceau was a close friend of his (and a teacher of Bowie’s mentor Lindsay Kemp).56 Like the American comedian Dick Van Dyke (see his performance in “Mailing A Letter On A Windy Corner”), Marceau created a comic routine—“Walking Against the Wind”—involving a sort of moonwalking that might have had an influence on Jackson’s famous pantomimic dance move, first performed in public in “Billie Jean” at Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever (1983).57 As for freak shows, Joseph Merrick, aka the “Elephant Man”, to whom Jackson amusingly refers to in the music video of his 1989 song “Leave me alone”, was played by Bowie in 1980 on Broadway.58 Merrick’s story appealed to Bowie, as he explained in an interview, because he (Bowie) has “a sort of eclectic thing about freaks and isolationists and alienated people”59 —which also sums up some of Jackson’s main interests.

56

For Jackson’s interest in circus-related phenomena see Anna-Sophie Jürgens, “Fun-de-siècle: Dance, popular spectacles and the circus”, Tanz & Archiv 8 (2020), 172–188, here 184–185. 57 Although Jackson is the most iconic dancer who ever moonwalked this planet, many variations of this dance move were in existence before. See e.g. “Silent Movie—Marcel Marceau” (a scene from Mel Brooks’ 1976 comedy film Silent Movie), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhhS13 sk7eg (00:46) (accessed 18 April 2020). Jackson’s style has been compared to Heath Ledger’s look as the Joker, on which see some (arguably tasteless) comments in Jason Kind, “Don’t Stop’til You Get Enough: Presence, Spectacle, and Good Feeling in Michael Jackson’s This Is It”, in Taking It to the Bridge: Music as Performance, ed. Nicholas Cook & Richard Pettengill (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press 2013), 223). 58 Photographs show Jackson and Bowie hanging out together backstage in 1983 (LA Forum); they are linked through the nightclub Studio 54 in New York (where they were both seen dancing), through Iman (the model who appears in Jackson’s 1992 music video “Remember The Time” and became Bowie’s wife the same year), through Andy Warhol (whom both of them knew; his portrait appears in Jackson’s “Scream” video and Bowie played him in a 1996 film) and Nile Rodgers (Bowie’s guitarist playing on “Let’s Dance” who, in 1995, performed on Jackson’s HIStory album, cf. Elizabeth Amisu, The Dangerous Philosophies of Michael Jackson: His Music, His Persona, and his artistic afterlife (Santa Barbara: Praeger, 2016), 137). 59 Bowie in “David Bowie—The Elephant Man Interview Special (Hosted by Sir Tim Rice)”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=262&v=UVqs7rPvgow&feature=emb_logo (accessed 15 April 2020).

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The 1982 audiobook and soundtrack album E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial accompanying Steven Spielberg’s blockbuster of the same name, is a good example: it is narrated by Jackson (and includes the song “Someone in the Dark”). Jackson appeared together with E.T. on the cover of the 1982 December issue of Ebony magazine and claimed to feel a strong connection to the alien creature. “When I was doing that recording,” Jackson says in the article which goes with the cover image, “I really felt that I was E.T., and it was because his story is the story of my life in many ways.” E.T. “has that super power which lets him lift off and fly whenever he wants to get away from things on Earth, and I [Jackson] can identify with that. He and I are alike in many ways.” Ever since he was a little boy, Jackson continues to explain in this article, he dreamed about being able to fly, and he “still dream[s] about it all the time”.60 That might be one reason he owned a moon crater. The crater was named after him by the Lunar Republic Society following his passing.61

1.4

The Space Oddities of Bowie, Nomi and Jackson—and Chimeric Clowns

In addition to the power of androgynous self-representation, Bowie, Nomi and Jackson share a common interest in space, alien images, futurism and its many stylistic manifestations, including chameleonic showmanship, enigmatic personacreation and artistic self-staging exploring the ambiguity between persona, performer and person. Their alien space alter-egos represent not so much a warning about their potential danger or menace (e.g. to Earth, humans or humanity), but promote nonconformist identities and offer (prophetic?) glimpses into an imagined future. Blending space imaginary, artistic expression of extraterrestriality and clown iconography and/or circus world references in their stage personae, Bowie, Nomi and Jackson—who all had some theatrical training—drew from and echoed the clown’s and circus’ cultural imaginaries: cultural ideas of circus arts and clowns that are largely dislocated from historical or otherwise particularised circus contexts. Pierrot is such a cultural idea (or cultural archetype), progressively changing and obsessively recurring in nineteenth century art, and more recently in literature, theatres and circus (where he is linked to the White Clown). Appearing in their performances in traditional or futuristic-robotic clown outfits, Bowie and Nomi burned aesthetics of popular entertainment into public consciousness. In her analysis of body identities and cultural ideas that have been linked to, or emerged from, aerial performances for over 100 years, circus and theatre

60

Jackson in Charles L. Sanders, “Michael: Superstar of The Jacksons reaches another career milestone with narration of the E.T. story and release of new album ‘Thriller’”, Ebony (December 1982), 126–132, here 127–128. 61 Ben Leach, “Moon crater named after Jackson”, The Telegraph (09 Jul 2009), https://www. telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/michael-jackson/5784734/Moon-crater-named-after-Michael-Jac kson.html (accessed 15 April 2020).

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scholar Peta Tait coined the term of the ‘chimeric circus body’. Chimeric circus bodies emerged with the New Circus in the last decades of the twentieth century (from the 1970s), and also with theatrical, animal-free shows (by Archaos, Cirque du Soleil and others) that took “artistic inspiration from a cultural idea of circus as identity transgression and grotesque abjection, most apparent in literature and cinema.”62 Exaggerating features of traditional circus, its interpretation in different, interrelated media, amalgamated with (parodistic) versions of freakery, queerness, outcastness—which historically have barely been explored in the circus arena itself but rather in circus sideshows and other related venues—thus created imagined representations of circus “that collapsed together very different acts and bodies”.63 Using such ‘imaginaries’ of the circus as projection surface for their own vision of circus, new circuses feed back their own visual circus fictions into our cultural fantasies of the circus world. Contemporary shows like UFO (see introduction) build on this tradition, not the aspect of abjection and misfit, but the display of extra-ordinary bodies. This happens, for instance, when between circus acts by ‘extraterrestrials’ and space robots two over two meter tall women on platform shoes (Ludmila and Tamara Titchenkova), without previous circus experience, appear in the arena to showcase their otherworldly ‘alien’ costumed bodies. Here, performance and offstage life conflate. Although this needs further investigation, it looks like chimeric circus in twentieth-century representation does not merely offer “an imaginary space in which to locate socially deemed misfits and outcasts and violent behaviour”,64 but also one in which to locate alienness. It is tempting to ask how the alien clown-related stage personae created by Bowie, Nomi and Jackson (for example by collapsing extraterrestrial and Pierrot bodies) belong in this sphere of chimeric circus phenomena; or rather paved their way and influenced them. Did Bowie and Nomi not stage chimeric clowns in their visual fictions, and how can they be positioned in relation to the above-mentioned flare-up of interest in freakiness in the 1970s? To answer this, another chapter is needed, but one thing can be said with certainty: circus producers are well aware of the cross-fertilisation between circus imaginary and the space-smitten iconic performers discussed in these pages. The Australian Spiegeltent show Rebel, “a live circus rock tribute” to Bowie, is just one example, featuring Bowie’s “Space Oddity” as a backing track to an aerial silks act in a night full of “glittering live glam rock, breathtaking acrobatics and aerials and a spectacular heart-stopping sideshow”.65 Another example is One, the

62

Tait, Circus Bodies, 123. Tait, Circus Bodies, 138. Circuses specialised in the staging of violence and death—such as The Circus of Horrors created by John Haze/Gerry Cottle or German Zirkus des Horrors by Romanza Circusproduction—may serve as examples. 64 Tait, Circus Bodies, 140. 65 “Rebel” (including a teaser video), https://adelaidefringe.com.au/fringetix/rebel-af2020 (accessed 19 April 2020). 63

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most dance-driven Cirque du Soleil show,66 starring the actual visuals, voice and music of Michael Jackson and 63 circus performers. A stunning techno-spectacle, the show adds new dimensions to Jackson’s performances and style, for example when his space uniforms are worn by actual aerial acrobats in breathtaking gravity defying stunts. The show also recasts Jackson’s signature glitter outfit from his 1983 “Billie Jean” performance with state-of-the-art light effects. The song “I just can’t stop loving you” is accompanied by aerial acrobats whose costumes (each) contain about 300 LED lights, which fit perfectly to an animated outer space background.67 Many other examples could be adduced within the broader context of starmen, spacemen, astro-navigators, earthwards falling men and alien-robots in popular culture, their understanding and approach to outer space (capitulation, spoofing, embrace) and their links to clown and circus aesthetics. Further analyses can study them in relation to the history of pop cultural space imaginaries in actual space,68 the history and sociology of glam rock (which did not develop in a political vacuum, of course); (British vs. American) social contexts and their complexity; the nexus between art and pop; and postmodernity, commerciality and fandom. Likewise, the influences and interferences between Bowie, Nomi, Jackson and the alien identities and eccentric performances of other artists performing between the 1970s and 1990s are worth a closer look. German singer Nina Hagen, for instance, a prominent theatrical figure during the punk and new wave movements in the late 1970s and early 1980s, claimed to have had UFO encounters and identified her daughter as the outcome of one such liaison. Called by one critic “Barbarellameets-Swamp Thing”, Hagen’s stage persona has been recurrently compared to Nomi.69 Todd Haynes’ 1998 musical drama film Velvet Goldmine might be another fruitful point for further explorations—a Bowie-esque interpretation of the Ziggy story (in which Bowie’s former mentor, Lindsay Kemp, has a cameo appearance as a panto dame). The film has been labelled an “orgiastic celebration of highcamp fakery and gender-fluid sexuality”, and takes for granted that transgressive (and queer) identity is part of the aesthetics of performing ‘aliens’.70 Finally, in

66 “Michael Jackson ONE by Cirque du Soleil | Official Preview of the show”, https://www.you tube.com/watch?v=Vtn-pnt1ub8 (accessed 19 April 2020). 67 “Michael Jackson ONE | Backstage at the Las Vegas Strip | The World Of MJONE | Cirque du Soleil”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vc9O3Da7O4 (accessed 19 April 2020). 68 On Bowie’s songs in space, see Musk in Phil Plait, “Eleon Musk: On the Roadster to Mars”, Syfy Wire (2 December 2017), https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/elon-musk-on-the-roadster-to-mars (accessed 17 April 2020). Cf. the clang and man whoops from the intro of the song “Riddle Box” by Insane Clown Posse that accompanies the protagonist entering a fateful spacecraft in Steven Soderbergh 2002 sci-fi drama Solaris. 69 McLeod, “Space oddities”, 348; for Nomi see McLeod, “Bohemian Rhapsodies”, 202. Cf. Van Ham, Lane: “Reading Early Punk as Secularized Sacred Clowning”, The Journal of Popular Culture 42, no. 2 (2009), 318–338. 70 Stephen Dalton, “Velvet Goldmine: 20 years on, has the time come for Cool Britannia’s Citizen Kane?”, BFI (23 May 2018), https://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/news-bfi/features/velvetgoldmine-todd-haynes-david-bowie (accessed 12 April 2020). Cf. Tait quoting from sources attesting to (historical) burlesque performers, who confused gender coding, the ‘horrible’ attractiveness

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the form of “neon noir” astro-glam pop, the aesthetic legacy of Bowie, Nomi and Jackson is reincarnated (and conventionalised?) in Lady Gaga performing in the mask of the alien and the clown in her music videos, thus taking different ways of lifting their artistic personae to another level. Her wardrobe includes Klaus Nomi inspired outfits; and Nomi (as well as performance artist Leigh Bowery) inspired her in her youth.71 Aliens and white clowns serve as costume and masks, but also as mediums for reflection upon the nature of art and the artist’s relationship to it, to the world and to technological advancement. Circus performances present artistic displays of skilful, entertaining, imaginative, inventive and mostly extraordinary action by rehearsed bodies and thus perform cultural ideas of “identity, spectacle, danger, transgression—in sum, of circus”.72 Singing space Pierrot imaginaries, in addition, mirror, shape and challenge cultural ideas of extraterrestrial physicality and looks, the quest for higher or alternate states of being and of space—beyond the moon. Acknowledgements The author expresses her gratitude to the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation for funding the Feodor Lynen Postdoctoral Fellowship that made this research possible, and to Bert Peeters for helping to clarify key components of the manuscript. Anna-Sophie Jürgens is a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) at the Australian National Centre for the Public Awareness of Science. She was an Alexander-von-Humboldt Fellow at the Australian National University, Australia, and the Free University of Berlin, Germany, from 2017 to 2020. Her research draws upon the performance histories of violent clowns, clown robots, and mad scientists; science and dance; and comic performance and technology in culture.

of an ‘alien sex’ (Tait, Circus Bodies, 28 (cited from Allen, Robert: Horrible Prettisness, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press 1991, 25)). 71 Victor P. Corona, “Memory, Monsters, and Lady Gaga”, The Journal of Popular Culture 46, no. 4 (2013), 725–744, here 725 (“neon noir” is a term coined by Jonah Weiner). See her costume in the first video still in Pickard, Anna: “Does Lady Gaga’s Telephone video ring your bell?”, The Guardian (13 March 2010), https://www.theguardian.com/music/2010/mar/12/ladygaga-telephone-video-beyonce (accessed 16 April 2020). See Gaga on Nomi and Bowery in Alexis Petridis, “From Yoko Ono to Lady Gaga: how pop embraced performance art”, The Guardian (8 July 2011), https://www.theguardian.com/music/2011/jul/07/performance-art-pop-lady-gaga-yok o-ono (accessed 26 April 2020). 72 Tait, Circus Bodies, 6.

2

When Art Was Science Barbara Amelia King

ABSTRACT

“When Art was Science” reflects upon the magic and the mojo of ancient artists who linked their destiny to space, at the time when imagination and interpretation was all the logic there was. Full circle, and we find twenty-first century space artists holding the key to the kingdom, yet again. This article explores the genius of polymathy, the ethics and agency of the educated, draws attention to myths and stereotypes, and exposes common ground. We witness the birth of science as empirical evidence becomes the new truth, and astronomical art becomes fashionable. The characteristics of space Artists and Scientists undergo a peer review and we prove the creative imperative still lives on. Social inclusion, environmental protection and STEAM education get the nod, and sustainability rules. We discover that art strategies drive design in the space industry, and the space industry drives the world.

2.1

Introduction

In Western culture the arts are categorized under the Humanities, and the nascent sciences were categorized there as well, under the Natural Sciences. Historically the relationship was tumultuous. With time, the disciplines became entrenched in a cultural paradigm that branded them and their practitioners as polar opposites: Art as a function of the right hemisphere of the brain, qualitative, with artists passionate and chaotic; Science as a function of the left brain, quantitative, and scientists as cold and impassive.

B. A. King (B) Peachtree Parkway Arts, Peachtree City, USA

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 A. Froehlich (ed.), Outer Space and Popular Culture, Southern Space Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-91786-9_2

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Although those mythologies dictated their relationship up until the twentieth century, space artists and space scientists then as now continue to share one common trait: an ardent fascination with what is in space, what goes on in space, and how that might relate to their day-to-day lives on Earth. Artist and scientists, two groups who conceive space and how to live in it, do not work in a vacuum. To a lesser or larger degree each is influenced by and reliant upon the inspiration and the ideas of the other. The dawn of the Space Age irrevocably altered the Art/Science paradigm by creating a bridge over this divide via transdisciplinary collaboration. Current data also contradict the historic dichotomy and reveal that artists and scientists are not stereotypical opposites, but rather, as being extraordinarily similar in their aesthetics, psychological profiles and creative processes. Statistics compiled and contextualized by educators indicate that overlapping polymathic ability in both the arts and sciences is instrumental in nurturing creativity and innovation, two essential qualities necessary for both meaningful artistic expression and scientific endeavor. One can extrapolate, therefore, that creativity and innovation also drive the space industry. Perhaps no other field of scientific endeavour has been more influenced by the arts than space exploration. The artistic visions of yesteryear are the technological realities of today. These technological realities in turn create new possibilities for artistic expression. Thus, the creative nexus between the two has never been as invigorating as in the present. Recent literature has taken note of the legacy of polymathic ability between practitioners of the arts and sciences. Academic and industry think tanks have examined the virtues of artists as space researchers, and conversely, scientists expanding their capacity in the arts as a design strategy. Thought leaders have expressed faith that transdisciplinary collaboration is the way forward in the global affairs of space, but none of these concepts are as widely accepted as needs be by the majority of decision makers in the space community. Therein lies the problem, these various studies individually lack a cohesive strategy to leverage their findings into a concerted platform from which to transform the Art/Sci dialogue into a leading disruptive force in the arts, space and society agendas. The space arena itself is undergoing a period of transformation, with the emergence of what is being referred to as the NewSpace movement, and the civil space development that has greatly lowered the barriers to entry for practitioners from other disciplines who wish to participate in space activities. This emergent circumstance also creates a unique opportunity to amalgamate the space arts and space science by utilizing the momentum of newspace culture, of inculcating polymathy through STEAM education (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Mathematics), and focusing on societal inclusion and environmental concerns to serve as anchors for space research and sustainability. We as a people are more advanced than we ever were technologically and about to embark upon building new worlds, so let us go back to the beginning and reflect. Who were the first space artists? How were they connected to science?

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The First Space Artists

Although the term ‘Space Art’ describes a modern genre, the term ‘Space Artist’ itself could be applied to our earliest ancestors. Evidence unearthed in 2011 reveals that artists have been producing artworks since the dawn of human history. One hundred thousand years ago artists left behind their abalone shell paint grinding equipment and compound mixtures of pigment in the Blombos Cave near Cape Town, South Africa. Along with it, hidden under layers of sand dune, were ochre shards etched with abstract designs, bone paintbrushes and quartzite grinding stones.1 Archaeologists dated the abalone shell containers and their pigments as 100,000 years of age, the oldest found thus far, which predates earlier finds by 40,000 years. This find is the first known instance of a deliberate mix of various mineral oxides with binders and curative liquids, and as such, dates artists as the earliest users of elementary chemistry.2 The innate drive of artists to practice art was born of human beings’ desire to express what they saw and felt, and are also the earliest records of art reflecting space. Among the images are scenes recording cultural events, natural sciences, fantastical beings and the celestial phenomenon of the skies. Art in the form of painting and sculpture is the earliest attempt at a physical rendering of the meaning of the abstract: the relationship between humans and their place in the universe. Visual artist and MIT engineering graduate Robert E. Mueller suggests that cave artists discovered spirits in the stars and invented gods to help control their physical and metaphysical worlds. Further, that paintings recording celestial bodies and events were completed in the hopes of affecting change and foretelling the future in order to manifest some semblance of control over their destiny.3 Art was the early human’s total science. He concretized supernatural powers through an artistic attitude, helping himself to cope with the realities which they simultaneously embodied and explained—Robert Mueller4

Artists were esteemed community members. Their art, infused with intuition and mysticism, was their magic, and their magical reasoning was the science of the age. In ancient times magic, religion, mysticism and philosophy were all merged

1

Pappas, S. ‘Oldest Human Paint-Making Studio Discovered in Cave’. Live Science, (2011), Accessed 26 March 2019. https://www.livescience.com/16538-oldest-human-paint-studio.html. 2 Sample, I. ‘Neanderthals—not modern humans—were first artists on Earth, experts claim’. The US Guardian, New York. Accessed 28 March 2019. https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/ feb/22/neanderthals-not-humans-were-first-artists-on-earth-experts-claim. 3 Mueller, R. E. The Science of Art: the Cybernetics of Creative Communications, Oxford University Press. (1967), ISBN 9,780,853,911,081. 4 Ibid.

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and became the platform from which natural science and all other subsequent scientific disciplines expanded.5 Concurrent with the development of natural sciences from Babylonia, Egypt, Greece, India, China, Meso-America and the Middle East, painters and sculptors capitalized on technological inventions and applied them to their craft. Artists took advantage of the depth that the geometry of perspective afforded their paintings, the inventions of bronze casting to create bigger, stronger sculptures, the printing press to transmit their ideas, and oil paints to expand their range of color and durability.6 In the European Renaissance period, (fourteenth–seventeenth centuries) the arts, music, literature, philosophy and the science of natural exploration were discussed with fervour and passion. The term ‘Renaissance Person’ described an individual who was a thought leader of the times, a master of several if not all of the areas of known knowledge in the arts, humanities and natural sciences. This is where the art of polymathic engagement came into play. As Art is the Queen of Science, Leonardo is the King of Polymathy.

2.2.1

Leonardo Da Vinci

Art is the queen of science, communicating knowledge to all the generations of the world— Leonardo da Vinci.7

One such universally recognized person who epitomized this polymathic era was Leonardo da Vinci. Painter, sculptor, architect, lyrist, mathematician, engineer, mentor and scientist. To Leonardo, art and science were one, and thus painting was a science. His natural ability to produce artwork was refined by single-minded study and systematic practice, his own version of the scientific method.8 He possessed the ability to imagine space and how machines would operate in it. He drew the Moon without the aid of a telescope, attempted to ascertain the orbits of the Sun, Moon and Earth and invented the idea of the helicopter, submarine, airplane wings, tanks and robots. The Renaissance sparked a renewed interest in the arts, literature, and sciences which provided a catalyst for independent thinking, apart from church and state. Additionally, the invention of the printing press played a pivotal role by providing

5

Violatti, C. ‘Definition of Science’. Ancient Science, World History Encyclopaedia, 2014, Accessed 27 August 2021. https://www.ancient.eu/science/. 6 Mueller, R. E. The Science of Art: the Cybernetics of Creative Communications, Oxford University Press, 1967, ISBN 9,780,853,911,081. 7 Maeda, J. (2013), ‘Artists and Scientists: More Alike Than Different’. Scientific American, Accessed 12 September 2019.blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/artists-and-scientistsmore-alike- than-different/ 8 Roche, R., Farina, F. and Commins, S. Why Science Needs Art: From Historical to Modern Day Perspectives, Routledge. 2018, ISBN 978–1-315–66,074-5. https://www.routledge.com/WhyScience-Needs-Art-From-Historical-to-Modern-Day-Perspectives-1st/Roche-Commins-Farina/p/ book/9781315660745.

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the means of sharing concepts, philosophies and images. The combination of these two influences expanded literacy as never before possible, which set the stage for scientific revolution by loosening the hegemony of the church.9 Europe’s Age of Enlightenment in the seventeenth century further provided impetus for the development of reason and individualism, rather than tradition, which in turn, increased the influence of science and the exploration of culture as a whole.10

2.2.2

Galileo Galilei

The predecessor of twentieth century space science, astronomy, is often called “the first science”. Although now synonymous with his name, Galileo Galilei did not originally invent the telescope. The first recorded idea of a telescope was found in da Vinci’s to-do list, noted in the Codex Atlanticus, “Construct glasses to see the moon magnified.”11 In 1608, Hans Lippershey, a German living in Holland, first unsuccessfully attempted to obtain a patent on his telescope. A year later, in 1609, Galileo improved Lippershey’s design and began recording his scientific observations. Astronomers had to become artists by default to be able to illustrate what they saw through their lenses. Galileo was fortunate, his early training in art and mathematics served him well. His chiaroscuro technique of contrasting of light and shade, as well as his understanding of the principles of contrast and perspective and enabled him to accurately depict what he had seen, and to be able to speculate on its meaning. Galileo also possessed a spectacular visual memory, as he only painted his lunar images from memory a year later so that they could be reproduced as engravings for his book Sidereus Nuncius, (The Starry Messenger) in 1610.12 Sidereus Nuncius is the first published book about the Moon based on telescopic observations which depict his drawings of the lunar surface, thus cementing his legacy as the founder of modern astronomy. The telescope’s impact on society was dramatic: it immediately caught the public’s imagination and popularized astronomy. Artists were called upon to celebrate astronomy’s lineage in illustrations and in paintings. Indeed, optics were the new magic, and produced wonder and awe from the detailed observations that had

9

Nguyen, T. (2017), ‘A Short History of the Scientific Revolution’. Thought Co, New York, Accessed 27 August 2021. https://www.thoughtco.com/scientific-revolution-history-4129653 10 Barentine, J. (2015), ‘7 Pieces of Art Inspired by the Night Sky’. Astronomers Without Borders, Accessed 8 January 2019. https://astronomerswithoutborders.org/gam2015-programs/dark-skiesawareness/dsa-blog/2646–7-pieces-of-art-inspired-by-the-night-sky.html. 11 da Vinci, L. (1513–1514), ‘Codex Atlanticus fol.674v’. https://www.codex-atlanticus.it/#/Det ail?detail=674. 12 Galilei, G. ‘Sidereus Nuncius fol.10v’. Venice, Italy 1610. The Warnock Library Accessed 23 August 2021. people.reed.edu/~wieting/mathematics537/SideriusNuncius.pdf.

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never been seen before. Astronomy became the new science,13 empirical evidence became the new truth, and astronomical art became fashionable. Scientists and their work, too, came under the scrutiny of the artistic imagination. Newton’s concept of a universe governed by rational laws proven by experimentation were essential for transforming natural philosophy into science and a cornerstone of Enlightenment Era thinking. Newton ushered in science and firmly placed it in its own discipline. And thus began the artists’ role in illuminating and documenting the import of scientific advancements. Newton’s studies of refraction, reflection and the colors of light enabled artists to become more sophisticated with their use of light and color. Artists were keen to take advantage of the contributions that the scientific revolution could offer in terms of content as well as from the improved composition of paints, papers and canvases. The invention of the paint tube itself allowed painters to leave the studio and go outdoors for the first time, it also allowed the artist’s imagination to soar in terms of experimenting with place, technique, light, color, shadow. And those experiments engendered new genres.14 The evolution of the humanities, which encompassed the arts and sciences, was predicated on a curiosity about the natural world, and a thirst for knowledge available through observation. During the Renaissance and the Age of Enlightenment, polymaths were able to expand the standard of scholarship by achieving mastery in intellectual, artistic and physical pursuits, that also embraced a concept of universality and humanity. Both Leonardo and Galileo were immersed in the scope of humanities in their time; classical art, literature and philosophy. Both were gifted teachers, and argued passionately with other philosophers about the merits of art and of science. Leonardo was well rounded, generous, theatrical, dramatic, fanatically collected books, loved music, was well spoken, and possessed a beautiful singing voice.15 Galileo’s last student and biographer Vincenzo Viviani attested that Galileo was a great talent who delighted in drawing to the extent of attaining membership of the Art Academy of Florence (Accademia del Designo). If Galileo would have been free to choose his profession at an early stage he absolutely would have chosen painting.16

13

Pearce, J. M. S. (2017), ‘Polymathy In Decline?’ Hektoan Institute of Medicine, Chicago. Accessed 08 August 2021. https://hekint.org/2017/01/30/polymathy-in-decline/. 14 Washington Academy of Sciences ‘Art in Science… and vice versa,’ Washington Academy of Sciences (2019), ‘Art in Science… and vice versa’. Accessed 22 February 2019. https://www.was hacadsci.org/art-in-science/. 15 Issacson, W. Leonardo Da Vinci, Simon and Schuster Ltd. New York City, NY. 2017, ISBN 9,781,501,139,154. 16 Roche, R., Farina, F. and Commins, S. Why Science Needs Art: From Historical to Modern Day Perspectives, (2018), Routledge. Oxfordshire, England. ISBN 978–1-315–66,074-5. https:// www.routledge.com/Why-Science-Needs-Art-From-Historical-to-Modern-Day-Perspectives-1st/ Roche-Commins-Farina/p/book/9781315660745.

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Another biographer, Mark Peterson, points out Galileo was also an excellent lutenist and an accomplished composer. Peterson further extrapolates that it was the mathematics of renaissance arts, not the renaissance sciences that became “modern” science. Peterson argues that painters, poets, musicians and architects brought about a scientific revolution that eluded the philosophers because science of the day was still steeped in a philosophical concept of a medieval cosmos and in the grips of the church. The recovery of classical science philosophy, the precursor of modern science, should actually be credited to the artists who continuously referred to Greek culture for inspiration into mathematics ranging from perspective in painting to tuning in music.17 With the advent of the modern age, science replaced superstition. The influence of astrology declined, alchemists became chemists and physicists. Philosophers, scientists, and artists fomented the Industrial Revolution as engineers provided the machines for mass production.18 The rapid accumulation of knowledge and the subsequent need for increased specialization necessitated the separation of science from the humanities into a discipline of its own, and in doing so ended the age of the great genius polymaths.

2.3

A Polymathic Legacy

The polymaths of yore were the product of a particular age, when learning was a mark of distinction because only a few could afford the luxury of the time and money necessary to do so. However, the enthusiasm for their subjects, the heated debates, that they could publish philosophic and scientific concepts and maintain libraries for the first time in history, all served as keystone events that accelerated the speed of the scientific revolution. Nonetheless, polymaths of the past continue to cast a long shadow. Then as now polymaths have had to pay for their limitless curiosity and divided interests. They are often viewed through a lens of skepticism, their contribution less valued in commerce or academia than that of their specialized colleagues.19 That being said, the true value of a polymath’s wide array of interdisciplinary knowledge is their ability to interconnect and integrate one subject into another. Although the era that spawned the Renaissance person has passed, the concept of

17

Peterson, M. A. Galileo’s Muse: Renaissance Mathematics and the Arts, 2011, Harvard University Press. ISBN 9,780,674,062,979. 18 Shuttleworth, M. ‘Science and the Enlightenment’. Explorable, 2011, Accessed 21 August 2021. https://explorable.com/science-and-enlightenment. 19 Carr, E. ‘The last days of the polymath’. 1843 Magazine, The Economist (2009), Accessed 20 August 2021. https://www.1843magazine.com/content/edward-carr/last-days-polymath.

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the polymath as one who is capable of developing advanced ability in divergent multiple disciplines, has not.20 Today the definition of a polymath varies in scope and degree within the context of the era in which the polymath lived or lives. The criticism of a modern polymath would be that they are “all style and no substance”. That the split in attention would necessarily create an individual who is not a heavyweight in any field, therefore the validity of their knowledge is suspect. One who is lacking the authority and weight, and a difficult person to accommodate in the academic sector, the governmental sector and the business sector. The sheer numbers of professionals now as compared to the past, the vast amount of knowledge arenas that have been defined by experts creates monomaths, and is quite an overwhelming situation for a polymath to navigate through.21

2.4

The Creative Imperative

What is common to art and science? Creation. Or rather, the drive that impels creativity. The thrill of the word and sound, of the colour, lines and shapes of art. The temerity of the scientific hypothesis which extends beyond reality. What is the aim of a creative act in art or science? To surpass reality.—Federico Mayor.22

Being overwhelmed, underpaid and insecure are detrimental conditions for the nurturing of polymathic skills. Although often considered by colleagues as somewhat treasonous, polymaths are intrinsically compelled by curiosity to investigate any field that attracts their attention, even knowing that one is stepping into an arena in which others are more expert, that it is likely an economically unsound move, and that it carries the risk of being unfavorably compared with others past or present. With the onslaught of technology, the curiosity and creativity of the polymathic individual did not go out of fashion as much as it morphed into a polymathy of degree and scope, as the needs of a technological society dictated. Following on from artistic and scientific polymath abilities exemplified by the dual pursuits of Leonardo da Vinci and Galileo Galilei, the next four examples illustrate the legacy of leading scientists who are iconic for the degree of their creative imperative in the arts: Johannes Kepler for writing science fiction, Max Planck for playing piano, Albert Einstein for playing violin and Richard Feynman for painting and drawing.

20

Friedman, G. (2018), ‘Who is the Modern day Renaissance Man?’ Quora, Accessed 28 March 2021. https://www.quora.com/Who-is-the-modern-day-Renaissance-Man. 21 Carr, E. ‘The last days of the polymath’. 1843 Magazine, The Economist (2009), Accessed 20 August 2021. https://www.1843magazine.com/content/edward-carr/last-days-polymath. 22 Strosberg, E., Art and Science, Preface by Federico Mayor, Abbeville Press. New York City. (2015), ISBN 9,780,789,212,191. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000117532.

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Johannes Kepler

As soon as somebody demonstrates the art of flying, settlers from our species of man will not be lacking (on the Moon and Jupiter)—Johannes Kepler23

As a child, German astronomer and mathematician Johannes Kepler (1571–1630) witnessed the Great Comet of 1577 which attracted the attention of astronomers across Europe. Kepler’s major contributions to astronomy are his Laws of Planetary Motion, and a true description of the solar system. His polymathic inspirations included music, such as the “Music of the Spheres” concept that music of the universe was key to understanding the cosmos, as stated in his 1619 Harmony of the World.24 Kepler also ventured into fiction with Somnium (The Dream), the first scientific storyline of the Moon as a destination. Somnium, written in 1608 but only published posthumously in 1634, revolves around a student of astronomer Tycho Brache being metaphysically transported to the Moon, and contains descriptions how the Earth might look from the Moon.25 Biochemist/writer Isaac Asimov and cosmologist/writer Carl Sagan consider Kepler’s book the first venture into the genre of science fiction novel authored by a scientist.26

2.4.2

Max Planck

The pioneer scientist must have a vivid intuitive imagination, for new ideas are not generated by deduction, but by artistically creative imagination—Max Planck (Gaither and Cavazos-Gaither, 2008)

Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck’s (1858–1947) origination of the quantum theory marked a turning point in the history of physics, for which he was awarded a Nobel prize in 1918. However, he was also a gifted pianist who delighted in playing the works of Schubert and Brahms. He chose physics as a career instead of music only because he felt he could make more of an individual mark in the field of physics.

23

Whitney, C. A. The Discovery of Our Galaxy, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. New York City. (2012), ISBN 9,780,307,817,099. https://books.google.co.za/books?id=gKmA1YInm IYC&dqs. 24 Peterson, M. A. Galileo’s Muse: Renaissance Mathematics and the Arts, Harvard University Press. (2011), ISBN 9,780,674,062,979. 25 Kepler, J. ‘Kepler’s Somnium: The Dream, Or Posthumous Work on Lunar Astronomy’. (1634), Original title (Latin): "Ioh. Keppleri mathematici olim imperatorii Somnivm, seu opvs posthvmvm De astronomia lunari". https://www.loc.gov/item/39010144. 26 Rosen, E. ‘Kepler’s Somnium - The Dream, or Posthumous Work on Lunar Astronomy (Translation)’. Translated, with a Commentary by Edward Rosen. (1967). https://www.goodreads.com/ book/show/5984974-somnium.

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Music was always near and dear in Planck’s life, he composed classical music, held concerts at his home, and had a harmonium especially built. He also played the cello and piano expertly, had perfect pitch, a beautiful singing voice, and sang in the university choir.27 Physicist and author Freeman Dyson describes the fortuitous occasion when Planck and Einstein met, and reports that Planck was one of the first scientists to recognize the importance of Albert Einstein’s work. When Einstein sent five papers to a physics journal in 1905, they landed up on Planck’s desk. Planck recognized them for their import and published them immediately, waiving the necessity of the input from peers. Almost a decade later Planck assisted Einstein to move to Berlin and take up a professorial position in 1914. Later they would enjoy playing music together.28

2.4.3

Albert Einstein

All religions, arts and sciences are branches of the same tree. All these aspirations are directed toward ennobling man’s life, lifting it from the sphere of mere physical existence and leading the individual towards freedom. The greatest scientists are artists as well— Albert Einstein29

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) began his violin instruction at the age of six and his mother Pauline, an accomplished pianist herself, also taught him piano. Music became central to Einstein’s mental and emotional processes; he would play classical music on violin and piano as a brainstorming technique. The theory of relativity occurred to me by intuition, and music is the driving force behind this intuition. My parents had me study the violin from the time I was six. My new discovery is the result of musical perception—Albert Einstein (Root-Bernstein and Root-Bernstein, 2010)

Einstein’s biographers often mention that Einstein saw Mozart as a kind of musical physicist; “someone who seemed to find his distinctive sound in the most cosmic essence of harmony.” Rarely would Einstein leave his home without carrying his music and often his violin. Einstein hosted weekly chamber music sessions at home, and he played impromptu violin serenades in the streets, surprising

27

Stuewer, R. H. ‘Max Planck: Biography, Discoveries, Quantum Theory’ Britannica. (2019), Accessed 12 Aug 2021. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Max-Planck/. 28 Freeman, D. ‘Max Planck: The Tragic Choices’. The New York Review, New York. (22 October 2015). Accessed 22 Aug. 2021. https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2015/10/22/max-planck-tragic-cho ices/. 29 Waldrop, M. ‘Inside Einstein’s Love Affair With’Lina’ - His Cherished Violin’. National Geographic (2017), https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2017/02/einstein-genius-violin-music-physics-sci ence/.

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passers-by at Halloween and at Christmas.30 Like Planck, music was Einstein’s plan B in terms of careers.

2.4.4

Richard Feynman

I wanted to convey an emotion I have about the beauty of the world... this feeling about the glories of the universe—Richard Feynman31

Theoretical physicist Richard P. Feynman (1918–1988) was awarded the Nobel prize in physics in 1966. He became a Professor at Cornell University and Caltech, and was particularly known for quantum physics, quantum electrodynamics, particle physics, quantum computing and nanotechnology. Feynman was also well known among his colleagues for his sense of humor, his love of life, and his passion for sketching and painting. Feynman began his art lessons in 1962 at age forty-four and enjoyed some notoriety with his exhibitions. After thirty years of drawing he filled over 100 sketchbooks which does not include the number of his finished drawings and paintings. If he would have had more time to devote to his art, he could have easily developed into a professional artist. It’s an appreciation of the mathematical beauty of nature, of how she works inside, a realization that the phenomena we see result from the complexity of the inner workings of atoms; a feeling of how dramatic and wonderful it is. It’s a feeling of awe, of scientific awe, which I felt could be communicate through a drawing to someone who had also had this emotion—Richard Feynman32

What is perhaps lesser known is Feynman’s synaesthesia, a perceptual phenomenon in which stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to automatic, involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway. Synaesthesia is a capacity which was described by Newton, written about by Kant and Goethe, and an- other sensory perception which scientists and artists share, as most people with synaesthesia are drawn to the fields of art or science. Feynman is in the company of Vladimir Nabokov, Vincent van Gogh, Nikola Tesla and Itzhak Perlman, among others.

30

Waldrop, M. ‘Inside Einstein’s Love Affair With’Lina’ - His Cherished Violin’. National Geographic (2017), https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2017/02/einstein-genius-violin-musicphysics-science/. 31 Feynman, R. and Leighton, R. “Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!”: Adventures of a Curious Character, W.W. Norton and Company, New York City. (1997), ISBN 0–393-31,604–1. 32 Feynman, R. and Leighton, R. “Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!”: Adventures of a Curious Character, W.W. Norton and Company, New York City. (1997), ISBN 0–393-31,604–1.

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B. A. King When I see equations, I see the letters in colours—I see vague pictures of Bessel functions from Jahnke and Emde’s book, with light-tan j’s, slightly violet-bluish n’s, and dark brown x’s flying around. And I wonder what the hell it must look like to the students—Richard Feynman33

How synaesthesia affected his science, or his art work and that of other scientists/artists, would be a fascinating ongoing study. Of late, both polymathy and synaesthesia have captured the interest of researchers who study the creative process. Space art and space science arose from a history fraught with antagonism between their forerunner disciplines of the arts/humanities and the natural sciences. This cultural animosity was entrenched for centuries, irrespective of luminaries such as da Vinci, Galileo, Kepler, Planck, Einstein, and Feynman having communicated the value of their own polymathic art/science experiences in their working lives. However, the arrival of the space age and its constant need to push the boundaries of creativity opened up new inquiries into the value of art to science and the need for professionals who migrate between the two.

2.5

Common Ground

The inclination to compare artistic and scientific similarities was sporadic at best throughout the nineteenth century. The acceptance of the traditional categorization that art is solely in the realm of imagination, emotion and creativity, while science is solely a matter of reason, accuracy and methodical process forestalled any serious examinations of the creative processes they both used. Therefore, they were considered beyond compare because they were not in the same league. That reasoning became moot in 1957 when the phenomenon of Sputnik, the first human-made satellite orbiting the world, demanded a game changing response. American technology needed to reciprocate, thus innovation and creativity became essential commodities for space science’s emergency problem solving predicament. The necessity to grow space capability exponentially in and of itself elasticized the boundaries of applied sciences, arts and philosophy. With President Kennedy’s mandate for a crewed moon landing only a couple of years away, the condition of having the artistic/intellectual and scientific information systems at odds with one another could put the mission in jeopardy. Artist and engineer Frank Malina, who stood squarely in both camps of the arts and sciences, clarified the relationship and redefined the boundaries of the disciplines, and Stephen Wilson interrogated the dynamics of the Art/Sci relationship to comprehend the legitimacy of their methods of inquiry.

33

Feynman, R. "What Do You Care What Other People Think?": Further Adventures of a Curious Character, W.W. Norton and Company. New York City, (1988), ISBN 0–393-02,659–0.

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Frank Joseph Malina

Pioneering astronautical engineer, co-founder of National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), painter, and kinetic artist Frank Malina (1912–1981) reflects on the differences between the concepts of Science and Art in his 1968 article Directions in Art Theory and Aesthetics.34 In it, he predicts that the estrangement of the arts and sciences will likely continue because science hasn’t made its objectives clear in terms artists can comprehend, and those who speak for the arts haven’t put forth a hypotheses that garners the respect of science, or of other artists in general. In an effort to inject clarity into the misunderstandings, Malina went back to the basics and offered the following explicit definition of the realms of each discipline and their value to society. Art The chief purposes of the visual arts are, by means of artefacts, to stimulate and satisfy human emotions, to help the human mind to comprehend the knowledge and conceptions of the universe and of the world to widen and deepen emotional perception of selected portions of the human environment. The theoretical basis of art is the concern for aesthetics. Science The word science covers the wide range of human activities stretching from the accumulation of knowledge about the myriad relationship to the physical universe and the world of humans, to the application of that knowledge for the satisfaction of human needs, dreams and desires.

Malina drew on his own polymathic endeavours to conclude that the arts and sciences were fundamentally related in that the human imagination and passion drove both scientific, engineering and artistic discovery.35 Another of Frank Malina’s legacies is his founding of the art/technology/science journal Leonardo in 1967. Originally developed as a communication channel for artists, in the ensuing years it has expanded to include papers from scientists, engineers and scholars in the fields of the arts and science. Frank’s son, physicist, astronomer, and author Roger Malina has expanded Leonardo’s content to include a music journal in 1991. Leonardo has become a globally renowned peer review journal that has published well over 4,500 professional papers. Leonardo’s growing influence as an International Society for Arts, Science, and Technology, is a platform that is demonstrably setting the narrative at international conferences to promote and

34

Malina, F. J. (1968), Some Reflections on the Differences between Science and Art, Faber. ISBN 978–0,821,202,944. https://www.olats.org/pionniers/malina/arts/differencesScienceArt_eng.php. 35 Ibid.

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publicize the intersection of the arts, technology, the sciences, and their value to society. Roger Malina recognizes the polymathic ability of his father and those like him, and the role they played during the development of the space age. Roger refers to polymaths as today’s ‘hybrids’ (those who have dual careers in the arts and sciences). Although they were few and far between then, today is a different story. They are spread among the fields of science and engineering in universities and industry, and have, indeed, become a phenomenon. Those artists and scientists who, by virtue of the overarching demand of creativity to be in service to innovation, have emerged in a pivotal new role as “Translators” for different knowledge sets. Roger Malina describes a whole new class of professionals: those who are mobile and navigate in transdisciplinary practices.36 This emerging hybrid community is carrying within it the ideals of a socially robust science that not only foregrounds ethics and values as core values in science and engineering but also celebrates the joy and pleasure of the well-being of human beings in all their irreducible complexity—Roger Malina37

2.5.2

Stephen Wilson

Computer artist, researcher, scholar and author Stephen Wilson (1944–2011) was head of the Conceptual Information Arts department at San Francisco State University and focused on the intersections of art, science, technology and culture. In 2002 he authored Information Arts: Intersections of Art, Science, and Technology, a compendium detailing their dynamic interrelationship as both methods of inquiry operate at the frontier of knowledge.38 He sees the differences and similarities between Art and Science as such (Table 1): The similarities between Art and Science are: • Both value the observation of their environments to gather information through the senses • Both value creativity • Both propose to introduce change, innovation or improvement over what exists • Both see abstract models to understand the world • Both aspire to create works that have universal relevance.

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Malina, R. (2013), ‘In Praise of Hybridity: Celebrating the 100th Anniversary of the Birth of Frank J. Malina’, Leonardo (MIT Press) 45(6), 422. 37 Malina, R. (2013), ‘In Praise of Hybridity: Celebrating the 100th Anniversary of the Birth of Frank J. Malina’, Leonardo (MIT Press) 45(6), 422. 38 Wilson, S. (2002), Information Arts: Intersections of Art, Society and Technology, MIT University Press. ISBN 9,780,262,731,584.

2 When Art Was Science Table 1 The differences between art and science

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Art

Science

Seeks aesthetic response

Seeks knowledge and understanding

Emotion and intuition

Reason

Idiosyncratic

Normative

Visual or sonic communication

Narrative text communication

Evocative

Explanatory

Values break tradition

Values systematic building on tradition

The Art/Sci Dichotomy Demystified

Contrary to the historic dichotomy, and advancing the logic of Malina and Wilson’s thinking, current research indicates that the characteristics and processes of artists and scientists are not only similar, but often overlap to the point of the practitioners being polymathic. Overlapping polymathic ability in both the arts and sciences are instrumental in nurturing two essential qualities necessary for meaningful artistic expression and successful space exploration: creativity and innovation. Closer attention is now being paid to the process of creativity that leads to innovation because there are two key elements that underpin the activities of the business community, the science community, governmental and NonGovernmental Organization (NGO) entities, the art community and society at large. That the process of innovation has been historically linked to the process of creativity itself is the reason that academics and scientists are giving artists a second look. Specific studies involving comparison of the polymathic talents between visual artists and space scientists are atypical, since the disciplines have been considered so diverse as to not warrant a comparison; a faulty judgment according to academicians Robert and Michèle Root Bernstein, Michael Espindola Araki and Waq¯as Ahmed.

2.6.1

Robert and Michèle Root-Bernstein

The studies of educationalists Robert and Michèle Root-Bernstein of Michigan State University involving creativity in the realm of Art/Science interactions lead them to conclude that although the products of the disciplines are indeed different in both aspect and purpose, the processes used by artists and scientists to forge innovations remain extremely similar. Compiling extensive research from numerous studies, the Root-Bernstein’s assessment is that an unexpectedly high proportion of scientists are amateur to

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professional artists, and that arts and science are part of one common creative culture composed of largely polymathic people.39 They present five types of evidence that correlate artistic and scientific attributes to support their conclusions that arts foster science and science fosters art. Successful artists and scientists tend to be polymaths with unusually broad interests, and training that transcends disciplinary boundaries.40 • Artists and scientists have similar psychological profiles as determined by widely used psychological tests. (as differentiated from those in business, for example). • Arts proclivities predict scientific success, just as intellectually challenging avocations predict success in all fields. • Scientists and artists often describe their creative work habits in the same ways, and use common interdisciplinary mental tool kits. • Scientists often state that their art avocation fruitfully informs their vocation, artists often draw explicit sustenance from their scientific interests. • The arts have often stimulated scientific discoveries and scientists has also influence the nature of artistic creativity. • The visual arts by tradition have been bundled within the auspices of the Humanities, which include the philosophy, liberal arts, literature, classical studies and language. We note here that the historical dissention between the two was academic. Between the philosophical element of the humanities versus the natural sciences, and not between the artists or scientists themselves. • Artists were intrigued by astronomy, the new visionary terrain technology offered, and they sought to synthesize anything new that could enrich their art. • As more studies concentrate on polymathic individuals who practice both art and science, one can extrapolate that they do not necessarily fall into one category or the other. The borders would be blurry. It is not a strict either/or categorization, nor in this day and age, does it need to be. • The polymathic interdisciplinary ability is at the core of innovation because the facility they possess to amalgamate elements previously not considered as related can be brought to bear on a design problem or an invention. The

39

Root-Bernstein, R. (2008), ‘Arts Foster Scientific Success: Avocations of Nobel, National Academy, Royal Society, and Sigma Xi Members’, Journal of Psychology of Science and Technology, pp. 51–62. 40 Root-Bernstein, R. and Root-Bernstein, M. M. (2010), ‘Einstein On Creative Thinking: Music and the Intuitive Art of Scientific Imagination’. Psychology Today Accessed 10 August 2019. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/imagine/201003/einstein-creative-thi nking-music-and-the-intuitive-art-scientific-imagination.

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• • • • •

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Root-Bernstein’s research conclusions on polymathy’s relation to creativity and success are:41 Polymathy of any sort is highly correlated with vocational success. The more artistic avocations a scientist engaged in as an adult, the greater their possibility of achieving eminence in science. The cognitive styles of the scientists were correlated to their avocations. That Nobel prize winners practice creative writing and visual arts at rates many time s. higher than those of average scientists Their conclusion: that creative scientists have the psychological profile of artists, and more often than not, are artists.

The Root-Bernstein’s years of research have legitimized polymathic ability in academia and adjacent circles. The result of which has promoted a growing interest researching the advantages of a polymathic approach in fostering innovation and creativity across a wide spectrum of fields heretofore considered unrelated. Author and academic Michael Araki recognizes the need to analyse the nature of each component of polymathy to determine how to best systematize the phenomenon to give rise to generalizable findings. In doing so, Akari finds that the core dimensions of the polymathic approach can be reduced to the common denominators of breadth, depth and integration. Breath refers to the comprehensiveness and variety of knowledge and distance between the disciplines (i.e., arts and sciences). Depth gauges the quality of the interest in and the degree of the knowledge procured: the dilatancy as compared to the profoundness of the knowledge. Integration encompasses broad learning, the ability to synthesize information from disparate knowledge bases and striving to create new knowledge. In this era of fragmented knowledge (inherited from the age of industrialization) the end goal is to create synergies between disciplines where none existed at the intersection of multiple domains and between different bodies of knowledge. Thus, the ability to recombine and synthesize knowledge is the core value of a polymath.42 In Polymath, Unlocking the Power of the Human Versatility, Waq¯as Ahmed chronicles polymathy through ancient civilizations of the East, West and Africa, and projects it beyond the twenty-first century. Ahmed’s work reveals that polymaths were some of the most influential figures in world history, and instrumental in shaping the modern world.

41

Root-Bernstein, R. and Root-Bernstein, M. M. (2004), ‘Artistic Scientists and Scientific Artists: The Link Between Polymathy and Creativity’. Research Gate Publication, Accessed 10 Oct 2018. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/232558153. 42 Araki, M. E. (2018), ‘Polymathy: A New Outlook Journal of Genius and Eminence’, 3(1), 66–82. Accessed 8 June 2020. http://www.researchgate.net/publication/324715756_Polymathy_ A_New_Outlook.

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He concludes that creativity at the art/science intersection has been evident throughout history, and as such, it demonstrates of the importance of and potential of interdisciplinarity. The visual, literary and performing arts have always attracted polymaths as their practice involves multiple avenues for creative expression. Science and technology have also used art as a vehicle to excel and vice versa.43 Artists and scientist alike are drawing on the same imaginative capacities of the mind, and endure the same struggle to apprehend their multifaceted ideas. To take advantage of this polymathic propensity, Ahmed envisions a cognitive and cultural revolution to educate a new generation of polymathic minds to take stewardship of the future, thereby engendering a highly motivated, well equipped society to address the complexity of the twenty-first century challenges.44 That requires a paradigm shift in the educational system specifically and the cultural mindset in general.

2.6.2

The Education of a Polymathic Nation

Over the past centuries the nature of intellectual endeavor has changed profoundly. The polymaths of old became redundant in the face of technology. The question for this study is one which Edward Carr also considered: did polymathy outlive its usefulness in the eighteenth century, only to resurface hundreds of years later to be the saving grace of an innovation-dependent world looking to save the planet by exploring space?45 Polymathy in the arts and sciences has been in the forefront of instituting collaborations, and has filtered into public awareness through media via educational talks, academic articles, papers and interviews increasingly for over three decades. Being a polymath is more than just having two or more interests in vocational and avocational activities. Rather, it is an automatic transference between those two mindsets, Akari compares the state of being polymathic to the facility of multi-tasking and raises it to the level of both an art form and a morality play. Akari also perceives polymathy at its best, reflecting back to the original moral and social responsibility that the privilege of knowledge evoked in the polymaths of yesteryear’s Renaissance: That a polymathic person places cardinal value upon and is driven toward two principal goals: the development of a conscience with

43

Ahmed, W. The Polymath, Unlocking the Power of Human Versatility, John Wiley & Sons. (2018), p 176, ISBN 978–1-11,950,848–9. 44 Ibid, p 5. 45 Carr, E. ‘The last days of the polymath,’ 1843 Magazine, The Economist, 1 October, 2009. Accessed 20 August 2021. https://www.1843magazine.com/content/edward-carr/last-dayspolymath.

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as much richness of knowledge and experience as possible and the exercise one’s agency to enhance and transform the world by their contributions.46 One detriment to moving polymathic ability out of the status of an avocation into the arena of a vocation is the cost of the education, and the time allocated for learning more skill sets. Also, at issue is overcoming stereotypes of polymaths as knowing too little about too much, and specialists only possess tunnel vision in their area of expertise. The relationship between the two need not be adversarial, as there will always be endeavours that will require specialists and others that will require generalists and they can live comfortably in each other’s worlds and the third world they make together. The rise of the current space era itself has provided an opportunity for the rise of the polymath with the assumption that a polymathic skill set will better equip space scientists and space artists to find solutions when facing problems in the new frontier ahead of them. How are these polymaths of each subsequent generation to be trained? That conundrum has not escaped the NewSpace billionaires, and those with high stakes in the civilian space force. Contrary to the traditional method of endowments after death for education and the arts, many of the Silicon Valley generation have turned giving onto its head. They give now because they want to train the workforce who will ensure their legacy. Therefore, they invest heavily in STEAM education. And why not? It is polymathic in nature, inclusive of gender, race and geography, is a proven success around the world, and they meet social, cultural, and environmental mandates as well. Polymaths of yore were trained in a catch as catch can methodology, and how far they were able to succeed was largely dependent on their own resources and acting against the most sage advice. It will be different now that the space related employment will demand the lion’s share of the workforce in the near future, and being proficient in one or more of the STEAM alphabet is the surest way to sustain oneself. Becoming polymathic is no longer a luxury pursuit for the wealthy, it is an essential part being employable in the future. But there is a backstory with STEAM before the A for the Arts was conjoined in the acronym. The system was once referred to as STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics). And art had no place.

2.6.3

From STEM to STEAM

The momentum of space science and the industries that anchor it require replenishment of human capital every generation. The Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) educational curriculum, with its global approach to sustainability, provides a heretofore untapped avenue to equalize the gender gap, and

46

Araki, M. E. (2018), ‘Polymathy: A New Outlook Journal of Genius and Eminence’, 3(1), p. 69. Accessed 8 June 2020. http://www.researchgate.net/publication/324715756_Polymathy_A_New_ Outlook.

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become the consummate platform to drive polymathic art and science crossover education. To advance its lengthy inter-generational projects, to engineer space applications for society and to continue space exploration, a STEM educational curriculum was put into place to meet that demand in various countries around the world. In the United States (US), a STEM-focused educational curriculum was designed to revitalize the flagging student competency in science and mathematics, but also served to ensure the continuation of a vital, motivated and innovative technology workforce. STEM has garnered traction in the US as national, state, commercial and private educational entities have promoted a STEM curriculum protocol to further revitalize and escalate educational successes. The STEM acronym was introduced by the National Science Foundation (NSF) in 2001 by its director of Education and Human Resources, Judith Ramaley, in reference to: ...an interdisciplinary approach to learning where rigorous academic concepts are coupled with real-world lessons as students apply science, technology, engineering, and mathematics in contexts that make connections between school, community, work, and the global enterprise enabling the development of STEM literacy and with it the ability to compete in the new economy—Judith Ramaley47

STEM addressed education in general, and served as a vehicle to encompass cultural needs of technology field to become more inclusive of gender, race and geography. In this sense, “geography” refers to not being isolated by virtue of place from others who are leaders in a discipline. To being able to take advantage of being geographically located in a sphere of influence, being where the action is, and being surrounded by other creatives. The United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), space agencies, and educational institutions globally, took an interest in the platform.

2.6.3.1 The United Nations and UNESCO STEM STEM curricula address the following United Nations Sustainable Development Goals: • SDG #4: Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all • SDG #5: Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls.

47

NCREST ‘STEM Education: The SECEP Vision’ Columbia University Teachers College, New York. (2014). www.tc.columbia.edu/ncrest/publications--resources/SECEP-STEM-Education-Frameworkv2.pdf.

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Fig. 1 Space Stem signage, STEM on the ISS, announcing a television show on NASA TV (courtesy, NASA TV)

STEM has become a platform from which UNESCO can counter the social/economic disparity precisely because they recognize STEM careers are driving innovation, social well- being, inclusive growth and sustainable development, and are imperative from the human rights perspective. In 2016, UNESCO agreed with the inclusion of arts and design into STEM as suggested by its member states.48

2.6.3.2 NASA Space STEM NASA’s Office of Education uses its national platform to develop a strong Space STEM educational program by offering opportunities for students at every grade level to participate in space research, competitions, professional development, and design challenges, with a special consideration to the under-served.49 (Fig. 1). Space STEM casts a wide net by partnering with other national departments, state agencies, and private and commercial institutes to leverage its assets such as the ISS and various space centers to conduct, and televise, Space STEM programming. 2.6.3.3 The Backstory of STEAM Since the inception of the STEM concept in 2001, proponents of the arts, such as electrical engineer, computer scientist, graphic designer, artist, and educator

48

UNESCO (2019), ‘Girls’ and women’s education in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM)’. https://en.unesco.org/themes/education-and-gender-equality/stem. 49 NASA ‘STEM Lessons From Space’. (2017), Accessed 16 August 2019. https://www.nasa.gov/audience/foreducators/stem-on-station/lessons.

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Fig. 2 STEM to STEAM poster (Invitada, 2019). Announcing the addition of Art to the science curriculum

John Maeda, have relentlessly fought to incorporate an “A” for Art in the STEM acronym. Maeda’s philosophy of integrating technology, education and the arts into an amalgam of creativity (Fig. 2). As former Professor of Arts and Sciences at MIT, Associate Director of Research at MIT Media Lab, founder of the MIT Aesthetics and Computation Group, and former President of the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), it is Maeda’s considered opinion that artists are familiar with navigating the terrain of chaos and uncertainty in their processes. Therefore, they serve as great partners in the communication of scientific research and in the navigation of the scientific unknown. Maeda has toured the world since 2008 to advance the concept of STEAM based on his conviction that scientists need art and artists in their professional lives in order to invent and innovate successfully; that for inventions to occur, scientists must embrace the art world. Additionally, Maeda champions the role that artists and designers play in the twenty-first century creative economy based on his belief that the current economy is built upon convergent thinkers; those who execute things, get them done. In contrast, artists and designers are divergent thinkers; those who expand the horizon of possibilities. Superior innovation comes from bringing divergents (the artists and designers) and convergents (science and engineering) together to meet the rigors of a competitive global economy.50

50

Lamont, T. John Maeda: Innovation is born when art meets science.’ The Guardian, 2010. Accessed 21 September 2019. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2010/nov/14/my-bright.

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With all that we have to address in the world—warming continents, fluctuating economies, monstrous cities—pursuing scientific questions in tandem with artists and designers may not seem like conventional wisdom. But given the unconventional nature and scale of the problems we face today, there is real value to be gained from collaborations that bridge the best talents we have in both the quantitative and qualitative domains. Artists and designers are the ones who help bring humanity front and center, make us care, and create answers that resonate with our values.—John Maeda51

On the forty-ninth anniversary of the Moon landing, 20 July 2018, the United States House of Representatives introduced the STEM to STEAM Act of 2017 as Bill HR 3344 (a new amendment to the STEM Education Act of 2015), that required the National Science Foundation to integrate art and design into STEM education curricula. It was not acted upon during that Congressional session and was reintroduced as the STEM to STEAM Act of 2019, Bill HR3321. As of 18 June 2019, the text specifically adjusts the bill to add “The integration of art and design in STEM educational programs” and “design and testing of programming that integrates art and design in STEM education to promote creativity and innovation.”52 The proponents of the STEAM movement seek to transform research policy by incorporating art and design into STEM for the integration of art in K-20 curriculum, to influence employers to hire designers and artists to drive innovation-based education, to support the critical role that art plays in the education system itself and also in the economy of the United States. The bill has been referred to the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology where it currently awaits action. It is evident that the A for art was not just given as an afterthought to the creatives like Maeda and others, they fought tooth and nail for it. Now that STEAM educational programs will nurture the next generations of creatives, and become the consummate platform to drive polymathic art/science crossover education. Creativity and passion win out.

2.6.3.4 The Status of STEAM The addition of Art (and design) in the STEM curriculum is a major accomplishment, and a hot topic for artists, designers and educators. Many opinions have been offered, along with studies conducted and published in the academic arena. To quantify the influence of art in the STEAM curricula using statistical data, Robert Root-Bernstein analyzed the benefit of students having artistic skill sets.

51

Maeda, J. ‘Artists and Scientists: More Alike Than Different’. Scientific American, 2013. Accessed 12 September 2019. https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/artists-and-scient ists-more-alike-than-different/. 52 Langevin, J. ‘H.R. 3321: STEM to STEAM Act of 2019’. Government Track, US. 2019, Accessed 3 August 2019. www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/116/hr3321.

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The Robert Root-Bernstein STEAM Research

A paper published by educationalist Robert Root-Bernstein in 2015 addresses the subject of the ability of art to foster creativity in STEAM education, and its influence on scientific innovation. Root-Bernstein concludes that arts and crafts can provide students and professionals with:53 • • • • • •

mental skills such as observing, imaging and abstracting sense related, manual dexterity and manipulative skills analogies that provide novel approaches to solving STEM problems experience with materials, structures, phenomena and techniques practice with the creative process, and recreation to relax and re-energize their minds.

It was not only altruism that drove the educational revolution towards gender, race, class and geographic inclusion in the science and technology fields; rather, it was the realization that STEM occupations drive economic growth and prosperity. STEM projects also address societal problems, global challenges and create additional employment in areas that are seen as being crucial everywhere. As a consequence, there are additional societal benefits in training a greater number and a greater diversity of the next generation to innovate, as each generation produces centers of excellence, and iconic role models for the next to emulate.

2.6.4

The Role Models of STEAM

Mary Golda Ross, the first Native American female aerospace engineer, and Mae Jemison, the first African American female astronaut in space, did not have the advantage of a STEAM educational program in their youth and few role models, which makes their endeavors to obtain an education and their outstanding contributions to the space sciences all the more extraordinary. They are both exceptional role models for space science and strong proponents for STEAM education.

2.6.4.1 Mary Golda Ross The traditional Cherokee belief that children of both genders should be educated equally paved the way for Mary Golda Ross to become the first female Native American rocket scientist (1908–2008). The great, great granddaughter of Cherokee Chief John Ross from Oklahoma, Ross obtained a mathematics degree and joined Lockheed Aircraft Corporation in 1942 on the design team of the P-38 airplane. By 1952, Ross had obtained an engineering degree, studied aeronautics, missile and celestial mechanics and was hired at Lockheed’s nascent Advanced Development Program, the only woman and the only Native American.54

53

Root-Bernstein, R. ‘Arts and Crafts as Adjuncts to STEM Education to Foster Creativity in Gifted and Talented Students.’, 2015, Asia Pacific Education Review 16(2), 203. 54 Viola, H. ‘Mary Golda Ross: She Reached for the Stars’. American Indian Magazine (2018),

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(a)

(b)

Fig. 3 a Mary G. Ross 110th birthday, Google Doodle, 9 Aug. 2018, Google. b The 2019 $1 coin honoring Sacagawea, the Shoshone translator and guide for the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Reverse side marks the 50th anniversary of landing on the moon by highlighting Native American participation in space (US Mint 2019)

Over the years, she worked on the Agena rocket, and the Poseidon and Trident missiles. She also helped write NASA’s Planetary Flight Handbook and worked on preliminary concepts for flights to Mars and Venus. Even today, however, much of her work remains classified, keeping the full extent of her contributions still unknown.55 A strong STEAM supporter, Ross was a Fellow of the Society of Women Engineers, worked closely with the American Indian Science and Engineering Society (AISES) and the Council of Energy Resource Tribes (CERT) to expand their educational programs, and CERT named its highest award after her. She was inducted into the Silicon Valley Engineering Hall of Fame in 1992, and endowed a scholarship to Women in Science. The design for the 2019 US $1 Sacagawea coin honoring Native Americans in the Space Program (shown in Fig. 3b features Ross (Cherokee), astronaut John Herrington (Chickasaw), and flight controller Jerry C. Elliott High Eagle (Osage/Cherokee). Herrington crewed the International Space Station in 2002. Elliott plotted the re-entry of the troubled Apollo 13 mission and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his role in saving the astronauts (United States Mint, 2019).

2.6.4.2 Mae Jemison Mae Jemison became the first woman of colour in the world to enter space when she flew aboard the Endeavor in 1992. A chemical engineer, medical doctor, and historian, Jemison joined the NASA astronaut corps in 1987. She orbited the Earth

Accessed 6 May 2019. https://www.americanindianmagazine.org/story/mary-golda-ross. 55 Society of Women Engineers (2018), ‘Remembering Mary G. Ross - First American Indian Woman Engineer’. August 9, 2018, alltogether.swe.org/2018/08/remembering-mary-g-ross-firstamerican-indian-woman-engineer/

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Fig. 4 Mae Jemison aboard the space shuttle Endeavour in the Spacelab Japan science module in 1992 (Courtesy NASA)

as a mission specialist aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavor’s Spacelab J STS47 (Fig. 4). Within her eight-day, 127 orbit mission, Jemison participated in 44 Japanese and US life science and materials processing experiments. In an interview Jemison recognized that she is not the first woman of color with the skill set, the ability and the desire to work in space, only the first chosen by NASA. As a kid I was irritated that the astronauts were always white males. It was really quite irritating that if aliens were to run into them that they wouldn’t recognize the full beauty of our planet and all the people on it.—Mae Jemison56

As a child who always loved the arts, dancing, and acting, Jemison branched out after she left NASA in 1992 to become an actress, a consultant for space related films, and a thought leader on how the interplay between arts, science, and scifi as a genre can carve out a space for often-excluded voices. Jemison’s IMDB credits are as an actor in Star Trek Next Generation (1993) and No Gravity (2011), as a technical consultant in six episodes of the Mars TV series (2018), and an

56

Eschner, K. ‘This Groundbreaking Astronaut and Star Trek Fan Is Now Working on Interstellar Travel’. Smithsonian (2017), Accessed 18 July 2019. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smartnews/groundbreaking-astronaut-and-star-trek-fan-now-working-interstellar-travel-180965277/.

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additional 24 credits appearing as herself in television documentaries or on-screen interviews from 1993 till current day.57 The value of Star Trek for Jemison as a youth was that it presented a hopeful future, where the variety of astronauts were more than that of just white men. Also, that Star Trek, even as a fictionalized science, nonetheless served as a mechanism for Earthlings to observe the effects of their society influenced by technology and that their technology continues to be influenced by societal values.58 It was the Utopian promise of diverse societies in peaceful coexistence with each other whilst exploring space that buoyed Jemison during her career, and also led to her precedent- setting global transdisciplinary initiative 100 Year Starship: 100 Year Starship is about fostering an environment where radical leaps in innovation can occur now, using the platform of human interstellar travel to push the boundaries of technology and knowledge, because we believe that pursing an extraordinary tomorrow will build a better world today.—Mae Jemison59

The media arts has overlapping platforms across its entertainment genre, each with its own audience. Margot Shetterly wrote the book Hidden Figures in 2016 to celebrate the life of African American Katherine Johnson and other female “computer” mathematicians who calculated orbital trajectories and flight times relative to the position of the Moon in the build-up of the flights into space. Hidden Figures was developed into a film script in 2017. The film received critical acclaim and garnered Oscar Nominations for Best Picture, Best Supporting Actress, and Best Adapted Screenplay. It also earned 4 nominations at the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) Image awards, and was ranked in the top 10 films by the National Board of Review. The book, the film, and women in science were further contextualized in Vanity Fair Magazine in 2017, which profiled the diverse new role models in STEM by interviewing women in science as well as theoretical physicist Michio Kaku. My task is to get deep thinkers involved who have never worked with space exploration, because they’ll look at things in a unique way. We have people who have expertise in areas from relativistic physics to textiles to anthropology to the microbiome. We look at how

57

IMDb ‘Mae Jemison – IMDb, International Movie database, 2019. Accessed, 28 June 2019. https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0420648/. 58 Space.ca ‘Astronaut Mae Jemison Talks Star Trek, Sci-Fi, And The Future Of Inter- stellar Travel’.2016. Accessed 10 July 2019. https://www.space.ca/star-trek-astronaut-mae-jemison-interview/. 59 Jemison, M. ‘Take the Next Giant Leap Forward’. 100 Year Star Ship.org (2013), Accessed 13 July 2019. http://100yss.org/mission/purpose.

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As an advocate for arts and science education, Mae Jemison is a twenty-first century polymathic icon for STEAM. She positions herself at the forefront of integrating physical and social sciences with art and culture to solve problems and foster innovation. Jemison also leverages her experience as a physician, engineer, and social scientist to build global initiatives that generate radical leaps in knowledge technology and social responsibility.61

2.6.5

The Sustainability of STEAM

In terms of STEAM going forward, Mae Jemison is a disruptive force to be reckoned with. Noting the value of portraying role models to the young, Jemison has intervened to expand the scope of the STEAM platform to include Vanguard Stem and Conversations with Women of Color in STEM. This intervention allows education to develop alongside of topical issues, and incorporate into its curriculum not only long hidden figures, but also long hidden problematic concepts of race, class, gender and politics. Her web series and online platform are dedicated to using STEM as a tool for social justice (#VanguardSTEM) and her end game is to broaden the dialogue to ensure a vibrant, relevant and sustainable STEAM.62 The collaboration evidenced by the zeal of the disruptive tech philanthropists, and the data gathered by Robert Root-Bernstein prove the efficacy of art processes as a key factor in innovation. John Maeda’s relentless push for art to be included within expanded science curricula, the phenomenal mathematical and engineering contributions of Mary Ross and Kathleen Johnson, and the future forward vision of Mae Jemison indicate that collaborative engagement between entities to achieve sustainability through art education is desirable, necessary and, indeed, very possible.

2.6.6

Ushering in an Art/Sci Culture

Analysis of the Art/Sci culture itself through literature and media sources indicate that the unparalleled vivacity of the disruptive space industry, combined with the

60

Vanity Fair ‘Saluting a new guard of S.T.E.M stars, parts 1–3’Vanity Fair 2016, Accessed 6 September 2019. 61 Jemison, M., ‘Dr Mae Jemison—Daring makes a difference.’ Dr. Mae, 2019. Accessed 1 July 2019. www.drmae.com/. 62 Vanguard STEM ‘About Us—VanguardSTEM’. (2019), Accessed 4 August 2019. www.vangua rdstem.com/about.

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explosive drive towards space exploration globally has created a unique opportunity by which to usher in STEAM nurtured education, polymathic workplace cultures, and a self-sustainable culture. With our dependency on space-based applications, space science is now driving the twenty-first century. Much is expected of space technology, and more players pile on the field from every direction. For example, the United Nations has recognized space-based technology as a driver of sustainable development, while the concept of sustainability, in all its complexity, has become the rallying cry for the reclamation of human civilization and of the Earth itself. Art/Sci must meet this challenge, and it has the mentality and tools and the collaborative experience to do it. Artists have brought to the NewSpace entrepreneurs a concept that societal inclusion and environmental concerns are integral elements of the sustainability matrix. This emergent circumstance has provided the momentum for inculcating Art/Sci polymathy and transdisciplinary collaboration into the arts, space and society agendas in the global commons and is, therefore, the next logical step in the development of human space activities.

2.7

The Creative Imperative and The Polymathic Legacy

The drawings and carvings of the first cave artists exhibit human beings’ enduring fascination with space. The polymathic legacy of early astronomers illustrates the creative imperative of scientists to express themselves through the arts. But perhaps the most enduring legacy is the polymathic outlook as a standard of scholarship in conceptualizing the arts and sciences. The advent of the Space Age has demystified the historic dichotomy between the arts and sciences, via transdisciplinary collaborations, and in doing so it has also highlighted the necessity of polymathic abilities spanning the Art/Sci disciplines in the current space industry. The phenomenon of the polymathic mind is receiving acclaim as space technology is embracing both specialized and generalized knowledge and skill sets.

2.8

A Culture of Transdisciplinary Collaboration

Transdisciplinary collaboration utilizes various branches of knowledge to create a vibrant culture that fast-tracks outcomes between practitioners of the arts and sciences. Art/Sci collaboration is not new, it has been occurring in various pockets such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), JPL, CERN, NASA, the Cosmic Evolution Survey (COSMOS), Leonardo, Ars Electronica, and at various universities, museums, and conferences since the 1960’s. With the sustained development of space technology and its commercial applications, collaborations are providing a context for polymathic overlap and thus, becoming a nexus of creativity and innovation and are thereby creating a whole new class of creative professionals in the space industry.

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Additionally, the media arts have created space science superstars, and provide a platform to share those breath-taking images that have been captured. The on-screen time afforded all levels of participants in the space community in film, television and video is staggering. Space agencies and the commercial sector are becoming more media-savvy, enabling media producers to invent yet new platforms (with the collaboration of engineers), on which to feature the newest space science and commercial applications to amass an even larger viewership. The Creative Arts, including media, are driving space and science education, policy and funding by their ability to create convincing information and images. The value of investigating the participation of the media arts is to celebrate the ingenuity of its creators, and also provide contrast to documentary films. Media’s influence on audiences with its portrayal of space art and space science is unsurpassed by any other industry and requires an ethical approach and a consensus on industry best practice.

2.9

The Polymathic Lifestyle Quiz

A paradigm shift is analogous to a living, breathing entity in a constant state of flux. It has many complex non-stable facets that affect its development and affect the expected outcomes. Therefore it needs to be nurtured and monitored as elements constantly change. The continuing Art/Sci inquiry that forms the nexus of the paradigm shift will need to constantly address/revise the following topics with regard to a shift in educational system and lifestyle that supports polymathic thinking. For example, can you answer these queries? • How can operating in the fresh landscape of the revolutionary New Space technology, disruptive philanthropy models, advance STEAM education? • Will a global focus of environmental awareness and robust space science ensure sustainability or obtain the critical mass necessary to significantly effect a paradigm shift in a modern polymathic dialogue? • Will the growing emphasis on polymathic tendencies and interdisciplinary fusion within the Art/Sci community sufficiently nurture the creative instincts that provide the innovation which drives the space community? • How can the concepts of transdisciplinary collaboration become as widely accepted as needs be by the majority of decision makers in the space community? • Can the models developed by and Leonardo/ISAST be used as a basis for creating a revolutionary, disruptive and collaborative platform for space art to be made, monitored and appreciated in the global commons of space? • Can the extant communities marshal their forces timeously to exploit this unprecedented resurgence in space exploration? • And can that paradigm shift be able to effect the agenda of the space arts and space science disciplines going forward in the next evolution of the space industry?

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Especially now that the global interest in space exploration and potential of future colonization has reached a fever pitch, the time is upon the practitioners of Visual Arts and Space Sciences to focus on coalescing the benefits of disruptive space technologies and polymathic skills applied in transdisciplinary fields. These interrelated topics indicate that the creative nexus of the Art/Sci disciplines seem limitless, as artists extrapolate from space data to expand the arts, humanities and cultural expression relative to space exploration.

2.10

The Creative Arts Agenda

The transdisciplinary ability of the Art/Sci dialogue to exert significant influence going forward has never been more critical, or as probable than today, as we stand on the precipice of game changing space science applications. Toward that end, recommendations to achieve the aim of using the arts to their full capacity as innovative and exciting change agents include: • Greatly expanding existing platforms and engineering new platforms for the visual arts and the media arts to reach ever-widening audiences with their ability to contextualize the narrative of space art/space science. • Obtain a global consensus on models of governance, ethics, conservation, funding and curating of space art. This would require first establishing a platform to encompass international and interdisciplinary leadership and a consensus on best practices. This endeavor requires a new genre in global law, that of space art which requires professionals to specialize in drawing up and implementing space art legislation. • The manifestations of the Art/Sci dialogue itself (its conferences, its papers, its art exhibitions, its podcasts, books) be published widely, publicized via media productions and inculcated in educational curricula. And in all those conference goodie bags. • Support the concept of NewSpace disruptive philanthropic giving and encourage further participation on a grand scale among high-net-worth individuals, corporations and entities whose mandate includes the elevation of education, arts, sciences, and society. Extend the capability of the public to invest in space with many more crowdfunded initiatives. • Legislate STEAM education nationally, and provide polymathic education and cultural cross-pollination globally to upskill subsequent generations who will be creating the Art/Sci arena in the future. • Encourage scholastic endeavours via scholarships for space artists, space filmmakers, and space scientists/engineers. Develop art/space camps with international participants so that they become commonplace. Embed polymathic education and art/space camps at all levels of education with varying degrees of sophistication, from kindergarten to post graduate work. • Fund more traveling art exhibitions, books, journal publications and video screenings featuring space art/space science to serve as social platforms to bring

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together diverse actors across the spectrum of arts, sciences, and society. These encounters enable communication between various actors in the art and space communities by creating common ground for international appreciation of the arts. Mutual appreciation for the art in art is one of the few methods by which to hop over political, social, class, race, gender and geographical barriers. That engineers/scientists assist artists to devise equipment, instruments, tools, and materials for space artists to utilize in the making of art on Earth, in space, on the Gateway, on the Lunar colonies and on Mars. Additionally, develop space art museums for the future to archive, protect and curate artworks for exhibitions wherever people reside. Encourage “smart art” for use in space, for example, satellite/sculptures that have dual function as works of art and are also sensors, rather than art that merely decorates satellites, or sculptures that eventually become space debris if something goes wrong. A Nobel prize category be established for visual artists as it is for literature. Further inculcation of the Art/Sci potential in international governance, such as the United Nations and its various divisions. That Space Artists and Art/Sci polymathic minds are offered a seat at the table in global think tanks and other international fora. This intent of this inquiry is to expand the knowledge base of the art and science disciplines by focusing on strands of inquiry specific to space art and space science, then weave them into a matrix that utilizes the creative imperative, polymathic ability, and transdisciplinary collaboration. This inquiry is directed to space artists and space scientists to highlight the critical nature of their work, and to inspire practitioners in both disciplines to meet the challenges of the forthcoming developments on Earth and in space.

2.11

Conclusion

The Arts and Sciences, more specifically Space Arts and Space Sciences, are two disciplines, which exert a forceful influence on the social, economic, political and cultural narratives in Western society. The critical nature of those narratives is the impetus for this inquiry into the historical relationship between space art and space science up until the present time. Paradigm shifts constitute a sea change in the direction of a society as a consequence of historical/social/political/economic/cultural circumstances that disrupt the status quo. Although they are experienced as a Renaissance, they are actually quite a rare. Thus, they need to be acted upon immediately because they are comparatively short term. Such a paradigm shift in culture is now at hand initiated by their own creative forces and the disruptive civil society and NewSpace movements. It is more than

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business as usual as Art/Sci creatives are taking this opportunity to embed polymathic education and a transdisciplinary working culture to ensure sustainability on Earth and off world. In his prologue to Ahmed’s The Polymath, Oxford Art History Professor Martin Kemp speaks to a paradigm shift of epic proportion as he links polymathic ability directly to the survival of humans. True polymathy involves a unique an improbable blend of incorrigible ambition, undeterability, imagination, openness and humility. And it is more vital now than ever if we are to further the cultures or mutual understanding that is necessary for the survival of the human race.—Martin Kemp63

Like Kemp, the intent of this article is also to link an Art/Sci polymathic paradigm shift directly and indirectly as the next logical and artful step in human space activities. Space arts, unlike the space exploration program after Apollo that was put on hold, has never stopped imagining life farther and farther into outer space. Currently, there are thousands of artists world-wide who are deeply involved inventing space art. They carry on the legacy of those artist of the distant past, and have created an untold number of art works regarding space that they fervently hope will enliven the world’s appreciation of art and space. All the years and all discoveries made in the space of time since that cave dwelling artist mixed paint in her/his abalone shell, have served to further entrench the concept that talent is by nature self-sustainable. That creativity creates innovation creates sustainability is an artist’s algorithm has unleashed an appetite and aptitude that the polymathic forerunners such as Kepler, Planck, Einstein, Feynman, Malina, among many others, dreamt of. What the artist has done for the scientist and society is to crack open the perceptions of creativity and allowing access to all, and further intertwining the historical relationship between art and science exampled by the polymathic masters of the past and present. The STEAM champions John Maeda, Mary Golda Ross, and Mae Jamison are also following through and thinking big. The maturity of the space industry has opened a remarkable new dimension for space art by providing the social, cultural, and financial momentum necessary for space science and space art to boldly go, and sustain whatever they create when they get there. Art and artists grow and develop of their own accord, yet have also become embedded with space science in the generational quest to comprehend the universe, and our place in it. Following the legacy of those cave dwelling space artists who were able to sustain the resources around them and invented the process of inquiry, when Art was Science.

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Ahmed, W., The Polymath, Unlocking the Power of Human Versatility, Kemp, p. xi,John Wiley & Sons. Hoboken, New Jersey, (2018) ISBN 978–1-11,950,848–9.

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Barbara Amelia King is a visual artist in traditional and digital genres. She studied visual arts at the Otis Art Institute and obtained an MA in Arts Administration from the Goddard Graduate School in Los Angeles in 1983. She has recently returned to the US from South Africa after nearly three decades of producing cultural and historical documentary films. Combining her interest in both space art and space science, Barbara was awarded a Masters of Philosophy specializing in Space Studies from the University of Cape Town, South Africa in 2020. A space researcher and writer, Barbara focuses on designing satellite missions to include ‘smart’ art, and a robust agenda of social/cultural benefits. She is a member of the International Association of Astronomical Artists (IAAA), Space Renaissance International, the International Astronautical Federation’s Technical Committee for the Cultural Utilisation of Space, (ITACCUS) and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). Barbara’s articles have been published by the previous organizations, in addition to Leonardo, Springer, and by the South African National Space Agency.

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The Limitless Horizons of Space Art Barbara Amelia King

ABSTRACT

Many iconic artists throughout time bear witness to the veracity of their endeavors for the love of art, science, and society. The intersection between space art and space science is their mutual fascination with the universe, its vast expanse, its planets and what might be on them. The space Art/Science adamantine bond is underpinned by the creative imperative to practice art itself coupled with the curiosity that drives scientific inquiry. The biographies of outstanding Art/Science practitioners humanize the diverse nature of those who engendered the modern era of space art. Additionally, this article examines the purpose and functions that space artists fulfill within society, the fulsomeness of the Art/Science polymathic experience, and what they portend for future generations of artists in the next evolution of space. Now that living off Earth is seen as possible in the near term, the horizon for space artists is truly limitless.

3.1

Introduction

Artists, in collaboration with scientists, endeavor to construct realistic images of the universe using the knowledge and the tools available at the time, both eager to contribute to the development of space technology. That creative nexus has never been as invigorating as in the past century as artists extrapolate from the vast arena of space data to expand the arts, humanities, and cultural expression relative to space exploration. The universe, its vast expanse, its planets and what might be on them, is the basis of space art and the interrelationship between space art and space science. As demonstrated by the earliest evidence on cave walls that depict celestial events, to art that has been placed on the Moon, Mars or in orbit up until current day, artists

B. A. King (B) Peachtree Parkway Arts, Peachtree City, USA © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 A. Froehlich (ed.), Outer Space and Popular Culture, Southern Space Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-91786-9_3

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strive to formulate that which they can see in space via technology, and that which they can still only imagine. The term “Space Art” describes a relatively new genre, obtaining its name and classification from its subject matter. The genre gained its provenance from developments in compelling fiction, science fiction, and as a result of the development of space science. Space art can roughly be divided into Astronomical Art (which depicts the cosmos) and Astronautical Art (which is chiefly concerned with depicting spacecraft, astronauts, habitats and activities). There will be overlap, as astronautical art is likely to be framed in an astronomical setting. With the potential of artists creating from space in the near future, one would expect new genres and new classifications yet to come.

3.2

A Brief History in Time

Space Art came to its own when satellite cameras captured photographic and film images progressively more accurately, offering a new platform for the artists’ imagination. Which is to point out that it is where cameras cannot go, the angles they cannot capture that benefit from the images by traditional artists, graphic artists and animators. In the mid nineteenth century French painter and lithographer Honoré Daumier was quoted as saying “Photography imitates everything and expresses nothing.“1 In other words, although the camera may record a scene accurately, it actually comprehends nothing; therefore, an artistic eye must be employed to contextualize the images. The artist then must formulate and present data graphically in such a way that they can be fully comprehended and appreciated by both the scientific and non-scientific viewer. These are scientific functions in which artists excel. From an artist’s point of view, though, that is only one portion of the Space Art domain. Astronomical artists also deduce plausible scenarios from the available facts when they interpret scientific data for use graphically or in the creation of a painting.2 To fulfil the imaging requirements of space agencies, astronomers, scientists, engineers, educators and academicians, artists incorporated more multidisciplinary skill sets into their portfolios. Those skills included photography, visual arts, illustration, computer aided design and multimedia necessary to demonstrate the ethos of the space experience. One result of those requirements involved artists who cross the traditional arenas of illustration and fine arts. That illustration is a trade which usually requires exact rendering or computer aided design does not define or limit illustrators, animators or graphic artists from including dimensions of the fine arts such as colour, line, shape, texture and light into their work. Many visual artists apply their talents as illustrators and the reverse.

1

Colon, Louisa. Best Photography Quotes of all Time, Nomad is Beautiful, June, 2019. /nomadisbeautiful.com/travel-blogs/photography-quotes/. 2 Dixon, D. (2017), ‘Cosmographica: Space Art, Science Fiction Art and Scientific Illustration’. Accessed 6 May 2019. http://www.cosmographica.com/spaceart/index.html.

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The influential arena of media, too, at once creates and fulfils an ever-increasing demand to provide captivating imagery of what space is or could be like. To express complicated astronomical concepts and renderings of space phenomena which have never been or may never be photographed, has provided a platform for the cross over between the disciplines of illustration and fine art. This section presents a historical timeline of five polymathic individuals whose vision vastly enriched the astronomical arts and also furthered the science of astronomy. One could say they “engineered” space art by combining their astronomical observations with their painterly imaginations. The remainder of this article covers more theoretical aspects of space art, and illustrates its purpose, its categories, and its functions.

3.3

The Polymathic Forerunners

In the era before Sputnik orbited round the Earth and precipitated the Space Age and the sea change in space science and space art that followed, five polymathic artists/scientists stand out. They have become iconic, some even obtaining a cult status to historians and art collectors. They are James Nasmyth, Scriven Bolton, Lucian Rudaux, Chesley Bonestell and Ralph Smith.

3.3.1

James Hall Nasmyth, Engineer/Artist/Astronomer

James Nasmyth (1808–1890) was a Scottish engineer, artist, philosopher, and inventor. Although born into an artistic family and having attended Edinburgh School of the Arts, Nasmyth first gained notoriety for his invention of the steam hammer. After inventing various foundry machines, at the age 48, Nasmyth devoted himself to astronomy and photography, and built a 20-inch reflecting telescope. Nasmyth’s remarkable illustrations of the Moon were created by combining sculpture and photography. Nasmyth set his scenes by sculpting plaster models of lunar features, then photographed them using pinhole camera photography.3 Nasmyth rendered accurate views using both his telescope and his deductive reasoning; such as Earth eclipsing the sun as seen from the Moon’s surface, the refracted ring of red light that renders the Moon dark red when it passes through Earth’s shadow, the “diamond ring effect” around the Earth that occurs during a total solar eclipse, and the correct size ratio of the Earth. After developing the photograph, Nasmyth further retouched it with ink to create shadows and atmospheric colors.4 It is a technique that is still being used by space artists. The illustrations in The Moon: a Planet, A World, A Satellite, written with author and astronomer James Carpenter, was published in 1874 to widespread acclaim, based

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Dixon, D. (2017), ‘Cosmographica: Space Art, Science Fiction Art and Scientific Illustration’. Accessed 6 May 2019. http://www.cosmographica.com/spaceart/index.html. 4 Ibid.

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on the extraordinarily detailed images, the authority of photography, and the reputations of its authors. Nasmyth’s artwork became the first space landscapes to appear in a nonfiction book.5

3.3.2

Thomas Simeon Scriven Bolton, Artist/Illustrator/Astronomer

An astronomer, a skilled artist and a commercial illustrator specializing in astronomical subjects, Scriven Bolton (1888–1929) produced a substantial body of work which was reproduced in a wide range of publications including newspapers, magazines and books in Europe and North America. Scriven was proficient in depicting space through the telescope, with his unaided eye or from his imagination. Bolton used a 26-inch telescope and established a private observatory, equipped with an 18-inch reflector. For a period of seven years, he carried out studies of variable stars, which were published by the Royal Astronomical Society. In many of his depictions of other worlds, Bolton’s technique was similar to Nasmyth’s. Bolton’s work was known to Lucien Rudaux and Bolton introduced Chesley Bonestell to the genre when they both worked together in London during the 1920’s. Bolton also sculpted plaster models of the object’s surface, photographed the diorama, then painted other details onto the final photographic print.6 Mr. Bolton’s story is presented in space artist Ron Miller’s The Forgotten Space Art Pioneer, Scriven Bolton.

3.3.3

Lucian Rudaux, Artist/Illustrator/Astronomer/Writer

Frenchman Lucian Rudaux (1874–1947) is considered the grandfather of the astronomical art genre because of his scrupulous scientific observation and his meticulous fine art technique. Using a 4-inch reflector, he observed the limb of the Moon and was the first to paint the Moon’s mountainous surface as rounded, a theory later proven accurate by satellite photography. Rudaux took on not only the representation of the Moon, but also the planets and the Milky Way. He visualized Venus as an eroded and rocky place, and Mars as a dust-storm-swept rock-strewn plain. He produced portraits of Saturn and Jupiter as seen from their respective satellites. Rudaux’s paintings often resemble NASA photographs, yet they were produced far before anyone photographed the planets or set foot on the Moon.7

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Miller, R. (2014), The Art of Space: The History of Space Art, from the Earliest Visions to the Graphics of the Modern Era, Zenith Press. ISBN 978–0,760,346,563. 6 Davenhall, C. (2012), ‘The Space Art of Scriven Bolton’, Culture and Cosmos 16(1–2), 385–392. http://www.cultureandcosmos.org/pdfs/16/. 7 Ibid.

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In 1928 Rudaux produced Sur Les Autres Mondes (On Other Worlds), which contained 400 illustrations of the solar system. It was his eye for astronomical detail and dedication to painting that garnered him the first entry into the International Association of Astronomical Artists (IAAA)’s Hall of Fame. His name also graces their award for lifetime contribution to the astronomical arts.8

3.3.4

Chesley Knight Bonestell, Architect/Astronomer/Artist

Inspired by Scriven Bolton, Chesley Bonestell (1888–1987) earned the title “Father of Modern Astronomical Art” because his polymathic talent was so diverse and his art work so persuasive that he was able to shape the mindset of his professional colleagues and the general public alike as to what the surfaces of planets or future spacecraft could look like. Because Bonestell was able to adapt his work to fit any form of media, he contributed to the explosion in space art books, magazines, television, poster art and film. One could say that Bonestell was certainly the right artist with the right skill set at the right time. He had acquired a unique set of skills developed from his Hollywood years as a special effects mat painter to create a believability, a certain credibility that was a level above an artist’s impression (Fig. 1). Bonestell used his knowledge of camera angles to imbue his paintings with the reality of photography, and his architectural background to depict perspective, mass and visual angles. His unique abilities and prolific output raised the bar for astronomical artists, and expectations from art collectors. Bonestell was still painting when he was over eighty years old, and during his life he had the opportunity to collaborate with writer and amateur rocketeer Willy Ley, nicknamed the Prophet of the Space Age, on The Conquest of Space and Beyond the Solar System. Bonestell also teamed up with Wernher von Braun in Conquest of the Moon and Arthur C. Clarke in Beyond Jupiter.9 Bonestell’s visions of space exploration depicted in books, magazines, posters and on television in the 1940’s foreshadowed the future, as neither space exploration nor rocketry were a national priority at that time, nor would they be for some decades to come. Bonestell became known as a space expert and did everything within his ability to keep space in the national mindset (Fig. 2). He lived long enough to see the space era emerge and humans land on the Moon. Bonestell’s work can be viewed at www.bonestell.org.

8

International Association of Astronomical Artists IAAA (2000), ‘Rudaux Award’. Accessed 30 August 2021. https://iaaa.org/rudaux-award/. 9 Miller, R. (2011), ‘The Planet Artists: Chesley Bonestell, Lucien Rudaux, and Ludek Pesek’. Accessed 23 Aug. 2021.: https://www.tor.com/2011/09/26/the-planet-artists-chesley-bonestelllucien-rudaux-and-ludek-pesek/.

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Fig. 1 Bonestell, Chesley. Saturn as seen from Titan, 1944 (Courtesy of the Artist, public domain)

3.3.5

Ralph Andrew Smith, Engineer/Artist/British Interplanetary Society President

Spacecraft engineer and artist for the British Interplanetary Society, Ralph Andrew Smith (1905–1959) had the polymathic ability and the unique opportunity of both illustrating and designing spacecraft. Certainly, one might call Smith an Engineer’s Artist, as he first proved that his spacecraft would be an engineering possibility before he it drew on paper. In 1938, Smith rendered and helped design the BIS Lunar Spaceship, a pioneering crewed spaceship study that laid the groundwork for subsequent studies.10 As Smith developed into a leading draftsman for rockets, he was able to share ideas with BIS member, astronomer and writer Arthur C. Clarke, and engineer Harold Ross. The Smith-Ross Space Station, named after them, was a collaboration in 1948. It was envisaged with a mirror to capture solar energy, a spin to provide

10

Parkinson, B. (2008), Interplanetary—A History of the British Interplanetary Society, BIS. ISBN 978–0,950,659,718.www.bis-space.com/what-we-do/the-british-interplanetary-soc iety/history/r-a-smith.

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Fig. 2 Bonestell Chesley. Saturn as seen from Mimas 1943 (Courtesy of the Artist, public domain)

gravity, and a crew of 24 people.11 In 1956–57 Smith assumed the role of President of BIS, and in 2007 he posthumously received the Lucien Rudaux Prize and was inducted into the Hall of Fame by the IAAA in recognition of the pioneering importance of his artwork. These five people represent only a portion of those polymathic individuals who are responsible for setting the foundation for Astronomical Art to flourish and further integrate space arts’ impact on space science.

3.4

Amaze, Inspire, Instruct: The Purpose of Space Art

It is well documented how the art of space has amazed, inspired and instructed many a scientist, engineer, writer, filmmaker and artist of yesteryear. Also, those in the present and most likely those of the future. But one wonders how so? Space Art itself has been discussed for more than six decades. It is a subject about which

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Shinabery, M. (2012), ‘British Interplanetary Society Proposes Early Space Station | This Week In Space History’ Accessed 30 April 2021. http://moonandback.com/2012/11/18/british-interplan etary-society-proposes-early-space-station/.

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generations of artists and scientists have had and still hold strong opinions. What are the actual functions of space art in relation to science? The purpose of space art is a subject that Professor Roger Malina, physicist, astronomer and executive editor of Art/Sci/Tech journal Leonardo, knows well and is passionate about: The space age was possible because for centuries the cultural imagination was fed by artists, writers and musicians who dreamed of human activities in space. Now with the end of the cold war the role of artists and writers is again crucial in defining our future vision of space and will once again be instrumental in incorporating the facts and discoveries of the space age into the cultural imagination.—Roger Malina.12

3.4.1

Categories of Space Art

Space art categories are based on where the viewer would be observing from, and what senses would be used in such an undertaking. The three overarching categories of visual fine arts in the space age, as first defined by Frank Malina five decades ago, still remain relevant: • Art made on earth with new materials developed by astronautical technology, space flight and exploration • Art made on earth to express new psychological experiences or philosophical concepts about the universe resulting from space activity • Art made on and used on the Moon and other planets.13 As ideas for space art projects are vast in scope and phenomenal in number, those categories have been further sub-divided.

3.4.1.1 Art that Depicts Space Hardware and/or Spaceflight Much of the artwork of the polymathic pioneers previously mentioned such as Nasmyth, Bolton, Rudaux, Bonestell and Smith would apply to this category. The genre was enhanced by present-day artists whose work span the publication field from trade magazines, books, newspapers, online journals, educational and commercial entities, and space agency outputs. Others continue the legacy of Chesley Bonestell by contributing their artistic skills to television, documentaries

12

Wilson, S. (2002), Information Arts: Intersections of Art, Society and Technology, MIT University Press. ISBN 9,780,262,731,584. 13 Malina, F. J. (1968), Some Reflections on the Differences between Science and Art, Faber. ISBN 978–0,821,202,944. https://www.olats.org/pionniers/malina/arts/differencesScienceArt_eng.php.

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Fig. 3 Rendering of the Moon Ark Project, 2015; (Courtesy Carnegie Mellon)

and film.14 All print and media platforms have become the way new discoveries are introduced to the word.

3.4.1.2 Art Designed for the Outer Space Environment The Moon

The Moon is the closest neighbouring celestial body and most obvious choice for placing an artwork. The USA’s crewed Apollo Moon landing missions presented the perfect opportunity to realize that goal. In 1969, The Moon Museum, an iridium-plated ceramic chip (the size of a postage stamp) on which American artists Robert Rauschenberg, Andy Warhol, Claus Oldenberg, John Chamberlain, Forrest Myers and David Novros drew simplistic designs, was covertly hidden in the gold insulation blankets on the leg of the landing module and left there on the Moon as the Apollo 12 mission went back to Earth. An infinitely more complex idea is one that Carnegie Mellon University is scheduled to send aboard their Astrobotic lunar lander that has been set to launch in 2021. The project, entitled MoonArk, (Fig. 3) is designed to function as a tiny museum of Earth life containing data, images, and physical evidence of art, architecture, design, music, ballet, poetry, and drama. A beautiful collaboration between artists and scientists suitably tagged -An epochal artifact designed to communicate forward across time and space.15

14

Woods, A. (2019a), ‘Art to the Stars: an Astronautical Perspective on the Arts and Space’. Accessed 1 May 2019. https://greater.earth/art-to-the-stars/. 15 Carnegie Mellon University (2015), ‘Moon Arts Ark’.

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Fig. 4 a A view of where the plaque was placed on Pioneer 10; b The visual message on the Pioneer Plaque. (Photo courtesy NASA)

With artist Lowry Burgess leading teams of artists, designers, scholars, researchers, scientists, photographers, educators, technologists, and curators over the course of nine years, The Moon Art Ark is a collaborative sculpture with disks that integrate the arts, humanities, sciences and technologies. The artists and the museum plan for the Art Ark to remain operational for millions of years, and continue to project its message using deep space radio wave transmissions.“16 Art on Spacecraft

Pioneer 10 (1972) (Fig. 2a) and Pioneer 11 (1973) (Fig. 2b) were equipped with plaques upon which physical and symbolic messages were inscribed, depicting the time, place of origin and location of Earth in relation to the galaxy, and line drawings of male and female human beings. Astronomer Carl Sagan’s design concept was to indicate to extra-terrestrials that came across the spacecraft who made it and where it was from, so that contact would be possible.17 Voyager 1 (Sep 1977) and Voyager 2 (Aug 1977) both carried a time capsule intended to communicate a story of Earth to extra-terrestrials in the form of a 12inch (30 cm) gold plated copper disk/ phonograph and a visual message engraved on a plaque. (Fig. 4a, b) The recordings contain sounds and images selected to portray the diversity of life and culture on Earth. The contents of the record were selected for NASA by a committee chaired by Carl Sagan of Cornell University and his associates (Fig. 5). The records contain 115 images and a variety of natural

Accessed 10 August 2019. https://www.cmu.edu/news/stories/archives/2015/july/moon-artsark.html. 16 Cascone, S. (2015), ‘Carnegie Mellon Is Sending an Impossibly Tiny Art Museum to the Moon’. Accessed 2 May 2019. https://news.artnet.com/exhibitions/moon-arts-ark-carnegie-mel lon-google-314394. 17 Rosenthal, J. (2016), ‘The Pioneer Plaque: Science as a Universal Language’. Accessed 13 August 2021.

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Fig. 5 The Voyager Golden Record Cover with diagram; (Courtesy JPL, NASA, 1977)

sounds, and greetings in several languages. The cover is aluminum and electroplated upon it is an ultrapure sample of the isotope uranium-38. Uranium-238 has a half-life of 4.468 billion years.18 Art on Titan and Mars

In 2005, the European Space Agency (ESA) included a CD containing messages and artworks on its Huygens space probe that landed on the surface of Saturn’s moon Titan. In 2008, the DVD Visions of Mars containing science fiction stories and artworks about Mars arrived on Mars via NASA’s Phoenix Lander. Orbital Sculpture

Space is often viewed as a very large canvas or very large cinema screen, and a four- dimensional playground for artists as it lends itself to projections. The temptation is high to play with kinetics of light and movement. Sculptures placed in orbit are a highly controversial and highly contested form of space art that necessitates a global response, and responsibility. Many inventive proposals have been touted in the last few decades, using a range of materials. Some feature reflective mirror coatings and Mylar balloons, solar sails, reflecting balloons, inflatable toroidal sculptures, binary tethers, and spherical satellites. The concepts also vary; some are designed as art for art’s sake, others as educational opportunities, some to engage the public imagination, and others contain humanitarian messages of unity, such as the 1995 Star of Tolerance balloon by Frenchman Nersi Raazavi to publicize and popularize UNESCO’s Year of Tolerance.

18

JPL, N. (1977), ‘Voyager: The Golden Record’. Accessed 8 August 2019. https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/golden-record/.

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One successful launch comes from the commercial sector. NewSpace launch company Rocket Lab launched The Humanity Star on 21 January 2018, despite the objections from astronomers. Humanity Star was a carbon fiber geodesic satellite, looking rather much like a disco ball, that reflected the sun’s rays back to Earth. It was conceived as a visible prompt for the planet’s population to consider/protect Earth’s place in the universe. Viewers had the opportunity to track the satellite’s location through its website for two months before it re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere.19 Rocket Lab’s CEO Peter Beck funded the space art satellite to call attention to a “one earth, one sky” concept. It also brought up the question of who owns the sky: the astronomers, the commercial sector, the political sector, the art sector or all of us? The reception of the astronomical community to Trevor Paglen’s Orbital Reflector was also mixed. Launched aboard a SpaceX rocket with 63 other CubeSats in December 2018, engineers lost touch with the satellite, which looked rather much like a giant triangular sword blade. When the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) went silent during that year’s government budget shutdown, the engineers lost the window of opportunity to complete the deployment, and it could no longer be tracked. This sculpture exploded the Art/Science dialogue as never before, with loud and long objections from the astronomical community, in anticipation of the sculpture’s interference with imaging capability. Despite the outcry, Paglen, whose consultative team included space scientists and engineers, complied with all laws and received the project’s FCC license. For Paglen, it has been a ten-year journey of designed provocation using Space Art as a catalyst for discussing the geopolitical militarization of Earth orbits, and the question of who directs the activities in the space commons. Paglen about the online war: My intention has been to bring some awareness about how profoundly compromised space has become by the world’s militaries and corporations. I want people to ask questions about the legitimate uses of space. I want people to think about who should have the right to put what into space, and to what ends.20 Trevor Paglen, 2018.

3.4.2

Art on Earth Viewed from Space

Visual art made on Earth with the aim of being viewed from space is artwork that is capable of being seen from the space stations or being sensed, measured,

19

Grush, L. (2018), ‘Rocket Lab’s disco ball satellite has plunged back to Earth - and some aren’t sad to see it go’. Accessed 8 September 2021. www.theverge.com/2018/3/22/17144208/rocket-labhumanity-star-satellite-new-zealand-astronomy. 20 Paglen, T. (2018), ‘Let’s Get Pissed Off About Orbital Reflector.’ Accessed 20 April 2021. https://medium.com/@trevor.paglen_21030/lets-get-pissed-off-about-orbital-reflector44ef70feb9bc.

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Fig. 6 Reflections from Earth, Tom Van Sant, 1981. The one-and-a-half mile wide sculpture was recorded by LANDSAT’s multi-spectral scanner, traveling at 13,000 miles per hour.21 (Courtesy of Ryan Van Sant)

filmed and photographed by satellites. The medium used in American conceptual artist/scientist/inventor/visionary Tom Van Sant’s 1981 sculpture are mirrors and sunlight. (Fig. 6) Ninety 24-inch square mirrors were set at precisely calculated angles to accommodate the rotation of the Earth, the speed of the orbit satellite and the position of the sun in the sky. Tom van Sant’s aligned reflective mirrors were undertaken as a symbol of hope, that a new dimension to human vision and a sense of scale could expand human being’s concept of themselves and the universe of which they are part.22 The collaboration included Van Sant and scientists from the Stanford Research Institute, the US Geological Survey (USGS) and NASA. These land sculptures indicate the depth of space knowledge Van Sant had to obtain to produce the intended result, and how that knowledge influenced the style, design and intended purpose of the art.

21 Thomson, C. (2015), ‘The Biggest Artworks in the World’. Accessed 14 Aug. 2021. https:// www.zippi.co.uk/thestudio/biggest-artworks-world/. 22 Van Sant, T. (2019), ‘Tom Van Sant’.Accessed version dated 1 June 2019, on 22 September 2019 via WaybackMa.

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Fig. 7 Cosmonaut Alexander Polischuk and the Cosmic Dancer on the Mir space station, 1993 (Courtesy of the artist, Photo credit: Gennadi Manakov.)

3.5

Art Viewed in Space and in Zero Gravity

Space technology allows artists a new dimension to their practice - that of freedom from gravity, the ability to have artworks float, or to create art while floating. It is an intriguing phenomenon which has been greeted with enthusiasm from visual artists, musicians, and dancers. Astro-artist Arthur Woods has designed and activated his sculptural art interventions aboard Mir and the ISS over the span of three decades. Cosmic Dancer 1.0 (Fig. 7) was the first three-dimensional artwork to be specifically conceived for and officially realized in a space habitat. The dancer is aluminum tubing painted with neon green speckles, and angled in geometric shapes, is 40 cm long and weighs one kilogram. Woods’ overarching inquiry underpinning the project was to determine more closely what role art can play in minimizing isolation from Earth. Cosmonauts enjoyed the avantgarde shape of the angular green sculpture which inspired their imaginations to experiment with what they could do with it. As seen in their video, cosmonauts played with it, “danced” with it to music, and noted the colors of the sculpture were a comforting contrast opposed to their very technological and very high stress environment. The Cosmic Dancer was on-board when Mir deorbited into the Pacific Ocean in March 2001.23

23

Woods, A. ‘Art to the Stars: an Astronautical Perspective on the Arts and Space’. Accessed 1 May 2019.

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We think that such art works are not only important to the artists who send them into space but also for us cosmonauts who simply feel the presence of a little artwork as comfortable. The rotating movement of the water in front of our sculpture is somehow perceived differently... from an emotional and aesthetic viewpoint. Sometimes it behaves like a living being, it swings and floats... and contemplating the sculpture turning in weightlessness while listening to music results in an effect which is possibly totally unknown on Earth.—Alexander Polischuk24

Cosmonaut Polischuk’s response to Cosmic Dancer 1.0 indicates that Woods succeeded in his purpose: to investigate the properties of sculpture in weightlessness, to explore the impact of sculpture in work and living spaces and to evaluate the process of integrating art into the human space program. Cosmic Dancer 2.0, which is not yet launched, is essentially a Do It Yourself (DIY) sculpture which requires the astronauts to print the pieces using the additive manufacturing facility, then assemble the three pieces correctly, and capture their interaction with it on film. Cosmic Dancer video and stills can be found at //www.cosmicdancer.com/ Cosmic Dancer 2.0 changed its colors and its locale by 1993. The Dancer is white and on the International Space Station. The production of art that is sent to space, completed on parabolic fights, on space stations or in orbit is only in its preliminary stages. One can expect much more complex contributions in terms of an art/science purpose to be created as time, technology and funding will allow.

3.6

Art Made in Space

Astronauts have surrounded themselves with musical instruments on various occasions to participate in a communal production or a solo performance on the ISS, such as Commander Chris Hadfield’s rendition of David Bowie’s Space Oddity, filmed in 2013. The video was a collaboration with the Canadian public who selected the song choice for Hadfield (lead vocalist of the all-astronaut band Max Q), and the original artist, David Bowie, who not only gave his permission but also updated the lyrics and assisted with the legal ramifications. Hadfield was happy to oblige the public, pay tribute to Apollo-era space exploration and to Bowie, as he too felt that the emotional resonance of Space Oddity would be heightened when it was actually performed on a spaceship. To document the experience, Hadfield developed yet another polymathic skill, not only as a singer and guitarist, but that of videographer. Hadfield filmed the scenes in the ISS during a one and a half hour scheduled downtime break (Fig. 8a). He manipulated the camera and lights as he filmed on various locations of the ISS, played guitar, and lip synched to the lyrics he had prerecorded in his sleep pod. (Fig. 8b)

https://greater.earth/art-to-the-stars/. Polischuk, A. (1993), ‘Cosmic Dancer: Cosmonaut Alexander Polischuk’s Comments’. Accessed 5 May 2019. https://www.cosmicdancer.com/Alexander_Polischuk_Comments.php.

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Fig. 8 a Still image of Hadfield in playing guitar in the Space Oddity music video, filmed aboard the ISS in 2013; b The sign that Hadfield put up on his sleep pod while he recorded the vocals. (Courtesy NASA) The behind-the-scenes video with Hadfield’s explanation of how he shot the video is available on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KaOC9danxNo (Courtesy NASA)

It became the first music video shot in space and has been viewed by upwards of 30 million people. Testing the effects of culture on the ISS is of interest to countries whose astronauts reside there. The Japan Aerospace Agency (JAXA), developed an Education Payload Observation mission to review the concept of culture aboard the ISS in 2012. The mission explored how sensory functions and conditions for conceiving “beauty” change in space. Two of the visual art/scientific experiments that were carried out on the Kibo station are discussed. The Sakura experiment, shown in Fig. 9a, was modeled on the flurry of Spring Sakura (cherry blossom) petals. Dyed silk petals floated inside a net while airflow was manipulated with a paper hand fan. The movements were captured with a 3D camera by NASA astronaut Don Pettit. The experiments were aimed at moving Japanese culture into space, and having space influence new creativity into thinking about traditional Japanese culture.25 Principal Investigator Takuro Osaka, from the University of Tsukuba, designed the Spiral Top experiment, a kinetic light sculpture utilizing modern art elements

25

Murayama, Y. (2012), ‘"Red Color Unites Space and Traditional Culture (Space Sakura)" was performed on board Kibo’. Accessed 25 June 2019. http://iss.jaxa.jp/en/kiboexp/news/120202_spa cesakura.html.

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Fig. 9 a Still image from the Space Sakura video, 2012 (Murayama, 2012); b The Spiral Top light experiment (Courtesy NASA)

of dots, lines, and planes, as seen in Fig. 9b. NASA astronaut Catherine Coleman activated the spinning top with LED lights and optical fibers that created an undulating aurora of planes and color of a steric light beam in a gravity-free state.26

3.6.1

Art Utilizing Space Data

Many artists consult with astronauts, scientists, mission designers, and other experts to design their art, and avail themselves to all materials available from the largesse of space science. As the information age has eclipsed the technological age, artists have become interested in artfully displaying that information, both for aesthetic appeal and for educational purposes. Especially significant is artwork that advocates problem solving solutions regarding looming disasters brought about by technology, such as space debris. Collaborations between arts and sciences are on a scale of simple to complex, depending on the goal. The following example includes a collaboration between artists and scientists to bring satellite technology into the public consciousness and daily routine of life, and design the satellite as a work of art.

3.6.1.1 ArtSat-1: INVADER and ArtSat-2: DESPATCH A collaboration between artists and scientists at Tama Art University in Tokyo and the University of Tokyo produced ArtSat-1: INVADER, which stands for INteractiVe satellite for Art and Design Experimental Research, the world’s first media art satellite, which was launched on February 29, 2014, on a Japanese H-IIA F23 launch vehicle into a low Earth orbit. Its artistic mission was to produce media that connects Earth with outer space via images, voice and amateur radio.

26

Osaka, T. (2011), ‘"Auroral Oval Spiral Top" Performed in Kibo’. Accessed 25 June 2019. http://iss.jaxa.jp/en/kiboexp/news/110513_spiral_top2.html.

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Fig. 10 a top view and b side view computer simulated renderings of the DESPATCH sculpture (ARTSAT, 2014). (Courtesy of the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science. www.isas.jaxa. jp/en/

The INVADER array of artistic output included algorithmic generation, and transmission of synthesized voice, music and poetry, capturing and transmitting image data; and communicating with the ground through a chatbot program. INVADER was operated by commands from the main ground station at Tama Art University. INVADER was a 1U-CubeSat with a mass of 1.85 kg.27 INVADER was equipped with a low-resolution camera (150 × 150 pixels), sensors to control lighting equipment, which changed color according to the satellite’s temperature data, an amateur radio, and a Digi-Talker, to transmit voice data using FM and to transmit sensor data.28 INVADER became the world’s first media installation deploying data from an operating satellite, as a participant in the Mission SPACE × ART-beyond Cosmologies exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Tokyo from 7 June to 31 August 2014 before it deorbited a few days later on 2 September 2014. Following on from ArtSat-1, artists and engineers from Tama Art University and the University of Tokyo also produced ArtSat-2: Deep Space Amateur Troubadour’s Challenge (DESPATCH) (Fig. 10a, b), made of the first 3D printed satellite parts conceived as a space vehicle and a sculpture. This nano-sculpture measures 50 by 50 by 45 cm in size and has a mass of approximately 30 kg.

27

Kubota, A. (2014), ‘ARTSAT: Art Satellite Project’ Accessed 12 May 2019 //www.isas.jaxa.jp/ e/forefront/2014/kubota/03.shtml. 28 Krebs, G. D. (2014), ‘INVADER (ARTSAT 1, CO 77, CubeSat-OSCAR 77)’. Accessed 12 May 2019. https://space.skyrocket.de/doc_sdat/invader.htm.

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The radio operates at an amateur UHF frequency of 437 MHz, transmitting “poetic messages” from space using its own telemetry parameters such as voltage and temperature in a tele-creation process. The art satellite has no specific mission such as scientific exploration or engineering demonstration. We hope to introduce an awareness of satellites and the universe into our lives by creating media art works, that appeal to human perception and sensation using familiar data transmitted from the satellite such as temperature, brightness, and attitude”—Akihiro Kubota.29

DESPATCH ended its operation on 3 January 2015, its last transmission from a distance of about 12 times the distance to the Moon, setting the new world distance record for a signal received by an amateur radio station.

3.7

The Functions of Space Art

In 1990, planetary scientist and astronomical artist William K Hartmann examined the categories of space art and described four functions for it.30 The first is to encourage the interactions between science and exploration so that society can comprehend and conserve the beauty of the universe. It’s a big ask, but artists are up to the task, as evidenced by the prodigious amount of work illustrating comics, magazines, and books since Jules Verne’s first publication in 1865, as well as posters advertising science fiction movies. All of this required illustration, thereby providing artists with a platform for their work, and an opportunity for generations of readers and movie goers to be engaged with the concept of space exploration. The second function relates to artwork providing an archive of the historical evolution of space exploration by the recording of actual events, and also recording the scientific thinking of the day. Scientific knowledge changes often as technology takes more accurate images and the data from sensing becomes more varied. A camera can also capture a scene and record history in the making, but the history that art can document has a far larger scope of describing the mood and human response to the moment. Traditional art methods also have the ability to later adjust the image to suit, the ability to paint something in or paint something out of an image, which a photograph, in and of itself, lacks. A concept artist for the entertainment industry, Robert McCall worked on 2001: A Space Odyssey, on Astounding Science Fiction (August 1941, Volume 27, No. 6), on the Star Trek movies, and on Disney’s Black Hole. He spent 35 years as a visual historian for NASA, documenting its emotional history and collective memory, including a Apollo-Soyuz Linkup a painting that captures the epic moment when

29

Kubota, A. (2014), ‘ARTSAT: Art Satellite Project’. Accessed 12 May 2019. http://www.isas. jaxa.jp/e/forefront/2014/kubota/03.shtml. 30 Hartmann, W. and Sokolov, A. In the Stream of Stars: The Soviet/American Space Art Book, (1990), Workman Publishing. ISBN 9-780-894-808-753.

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former enemies became allies in space, when there were no cameras in sight to record the event. Robert McCall’s work can be seen at http://www.mccallstudios. com/ Apollo-Soyuz Link up, shown on the right side of the image (Fig. 11) portrays a historic moment in the lives of millions, yet it was unobserved by human eye or exterior camera lenses. There are several layers of drama happening in space at any given time, and in the same space over time. My rendition of McCall’s Apollo-Soyuz link up, includes their momentous yet peaceful linking, and also the Hubble, whose hectic rescue mission to fix Hubble’s mirrors (left side of image). In the background, the chaos of layers of satellites and rocket bodies hurtling through space on different trajectories, a catastrophe in the making. It is the artist who can reduce astronomical distances into one image, in this case, to prioritize the glory of historical and technological achievements, amid the dangers of space debris collisions. The third role of space art concerns the use of arts as an initiative to bridge political divides by nudging the international community towards common goals, joint ventures and future collaborations. As a matter of practicality, the timeline of artists working together to install a joint exhibition is much faster than any governmental bureaucracy could accommodate, and exhibitions draw society towards contemplating a new, different, and hopefully better future. The fourth role is to connect art and science in a practical working sense by comparing notes and discussing the physics shown in paintings, with artists playing a more direct role in scientific research by designing ways to present information,

Fig. 11 “After Robert McCall’s Unobserved Apollo-Soyuz Linkup” B.A. King, Digital print on paper 2021. (Courtesy of the artist)

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to communicate with other scientists, and to stimulate scientific visualization to inspire new ideas.31 These interrelated roles and functions indicate that the creative nexus of the space Art/Science disciplines has never been as replete with possibility as now, as artists continue to extrapolate from the vast arena of space data to expand the arts, humanities and cultural expression relative to space exploration. Especially now that the global interest in space exploration and potential of future colonization has reached a fever pitch, the time is upon the practitioners of Visual Arts and Space Sciences to focus on coalescing the benefits of disruptive space technologies and polymathic skills applied in transdisciplinary fields.

3.8

Conclusion

From time immemorial, before the written word and recorded history, artists have exhibited the presence of mind to chronicle celestial events and their consequence on human life. Art’s inspirational and aspirational effect has breathed life into the imaginations and the careers of many an astronaut, scientist and engineer. One of the most important functions of twenty-first century space art has become to serve as an ambassador for space science and technology, and to provide leadership and collaborative support in the advocacy for societal change. As the purpose and function of art evolve following the dictates of a spacefaring civilization, so too will the ability of Space Artists to stay the course. The disciplines of art and science have become two of the most important influencers of civilization on Earth and will be the same off world. With the idea of living in space conceived of for the near future, the horizon for space artists is truly limitless.

Barbara Amelia King is a visual artist in traditional and digital genres. She studied visual arts at the Otis Art Institute and obtained an MA in Arts Administration from the Goddard Graduate School in Los Angeles in 1983. She has recently returned to the US from South Africa after nearly three decades of producing cultural and historical documentary films. Combining her interest in both space art and space science, Barbara was awarded a Masters of Philosophy specializing in Space Studies from the University of Cape Town, South Africa in 2020. A space researcher and writer, Barbara focuses on designing satellite missions to include ‘smart’ art, and a robust agenda of social/cultural benefits. She is a member of the International Association of Astronomical Artists (IAAA), Space Renaissance International, the International Astronautical Federation’s Technical Committee for the Cultural Utilisation of Space, (ITACCUS) and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). Barbara’s articles have been published by the previous organizations, in addition to Leonardo, Springer, and the South African National Space Agency.

31

Hartmann, W. and Sokolov, A. (1990), In the Stream of Stars: The Soviet/American Space Art Book, Workman Publishing. ISBN 9-780-894-808-753.

4

Rockets and Science Fiction: A Mutual Journey Christoffel Kotze

ABSTRACT

The launch of a rocket is arguably the closest an immediate observer will ever get to physically experience a portion of a space mission, albeit brief as only minutes after the lift off the rocket and its payload will become invisible to the human eye. In that sense one could argue that rockets have become the ubiquitous symbol of the modern space mission as thus far it is the only proven technology to get a spacecraft from the Earth’s surface to Earth orbit and beyond. As the first point of failure for a space mission a high rate of reliability is obviously a necessary requirement, with the relative low rate of failure from modern launch operators a testament to the successful evolution of rocket technology. The aim of this article is to investigate the relationship between the development of rocket technology and that of science fiction and how the two topics have intersected and mutually influenced each other through the years. A twofold approach is followed; firstly, to provide an overview of the rocket’s evolution from its relatively primitive beginnings as ‘fire arrows’ almost a thousand years ago into the modern rocket, large towering structures with the ability to move thousands of kilograms from earth into space. Secondly the work looks at the role of the science fiction genre and how its predictions and speculations possibly influenced the evolution of the rocket.

1

Seasky, “Space Quotes”, http://www.seasky.org/quotes/space-quotes-space-travel.html (all websites cited in this chapter were last accessed and verified on 30 September 2021).

C. Kotze (B) NOEZ Strategic Advisory, Cape Town, South Africa e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 A. Froehlich (ed.), Outer Space and Popular Culture, Southern Space Studies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-91786-9_4

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4.1

Introduction

The rocket will free man from his remaining chains, the chains of gravity which still tie him to this planet. It will open to him the gates of heaven.—Wernher von Braun.1

In reality, though travelling to space has been the reserve of a very tiny select group of people, watching a space bound rocket launch can serve as a powerful opportunity of inspiration for the rest of humanity. Such an event took place on May 30th, 2020 when millions of internet-viewers, most confined to their homes still subjected to some form of ‘lockdown’ during the initial Covid-192 pandemic, were able to find a moment of freedom in watching the NASA-SpaceX launch of the Crew Dragon.3 The age of privatised human space travel had finally arrived enabled by a rocket developed by the private company SpaceX4 to deliver a human cargo to the International Space Station (ISS) an activity previously the exclusive domain of government organisations. There are different interpretations of just where space begins, generally it is considered as venturing beyond the so-called Kármán line, an imaginary border roughly one hundred kilometres above the Earth, (so defined by the Federation Aeronautique Internationale (FAI), an organisation keeping records related to astronautics) and it will as such be used in this work as defining the border with space.5 As of June 2020 less than six hundred people have ventured beyond the Kármán line (as per FAI definition) a number that is surely to increase after a number of successful space ‘tourist’ rocket-powered launches in 2021. The vast majority of these space travellers survived their journey, though there have been a number of unfortunate accidents which resulted in a number of fatalities. Perhaps the most well-known of these involved two of the craft used by NASA in its ‘Space Shuttle’ program which stretched over a thirty year period; first mission launched on April 12th, 1981 and the final landing on July 21st, 2011.6 The program had an emphasis on reusable components in the form of the actual orbiter craft itself as well as the two booster rockets used in the initial phase of the launch process. The first disaster happened on January 28th, 1986 when the shuttle Challenger was engulfed in flames just 73 s after its lift-off from the launch pad; the result of a cascade of unfortunate events resulting in the uncontrolled ignition of the propellant in the main fuel tank of the space craft, with disastrous consequences.7

2

WHO. “Archived: WHO Timeline—COVID-19”, 27 April 2020, https://www.who.int/newsroom/detail/27-04-2020-who-timeline---covid-19. 3 SpaceX, “Dragon—Sending humans and cargo into space”, https://www.spacex.com/vehicles/ dragon/. 4 SpaceX, “Mission”, https://www.spacex.com/mission/. 5 Nadia Drake, “Where, exactly, is the edge of space? It depends on who you ask”, 20 December 2018, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2018/12/where-is-the-edge-of-space-andwhat-is-the-karman-line/. 6 NASA, “Space Shuttle Era”, https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/flyout/index.html. 7 Mike Wall, “Challenger Disaster 30 Years Ago Shocked the World, Changed NASA”, 28 January 2016, https://www.space.com/31760-space-shuttle-challenger-disaster-30-years.html.

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According to the Report of the Presidential Commission on the space shuttle Challenger accident (1986) the final destruction of the orbiter craft commenced at an altitude of 14.000 m whilst still travelling at approximately 2.352 km/h resulting in the loss of all seven crew.8 On February 1st, 2003 a second accident involving a shuttle occurred when the orbiter Columbia, ironically the same craft that started the ‘Shuttle’ era in 1981 was lost after a successful sixteen day space mission with all seven of its crew members, just sixteen minutes before the scheduled touchdown.9 The cause of the accident was traced back to the launch where a piece of foam became dislodged, ultimately resulting in the craft breaking up in the atmosphere; the last communication received from the craft happened at an altitude of 61.170 m.10 Tragic as the two shuttle accidents were, neither actually happened above the Kármán line, the only official fatalities recorded in space at the time of the writing of this work was part of a mission conducted by the space agency of the USSR. June 30th, 1971 will be remembered in history as the day when the first human causalities occurred in what is defined as space, when all three crew members of the Soyuz 11 mission died, the result of a leaking valve at an altitude of approximately 168 km above the surface on its return to Earth.11 The tragic incidents mentioned fortunately have been by far in the minority and many humans (including astronauts, cosmonauts, taikonauts even ‘space tourists’) from many nationalities have reached space successfully, all having one thing in common; they started their initial journey to space in a rocket powered launch vehicle, the rocket allowing them to break free from the gravity of Earth. Rockets have become almost intuitively associated with space exploration as it is literally the start of the journey and essentially the only portion visible with the naked eye, provided the observer is close enough. Although it is by far the shortest stage of any space mission (if expressed as a percentage of total mission life it truly becomes negligible) the launch as the first point of failure, is arguably the most important and delicate phase. Visible from the observers’ perspective, albeit for a minuscule amount of time, it does represent one of the most spectacular visual displays involved with any mission. Apollo 17 as the last of the lunar missions was launched after midnight (the only Saturn V launch at night time) and for the more than half-a-million people observing the launch in the immediate area, it literally turned the night into day and was estimated to be seen 800 km

8

Presidential Commission on the Space Shuttle Challenger Accident, Report of the Presidential Commission on the Space Shuttle Challenger accident, (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office: 1986), 450. 9 Paul Keller, Searching For And Recovering The Space Shuttle Columbia, National Wildfire Coordinating Group, (2003), https://www.nwcg.gov/sites/default/files/wfldp/docs/searching-andrecovering-space-shuttle-columbia.pdf. 10 Elizabeth Howell, “Columbia Disaster: What happened and what NASA learned”, 1 February 2019, https://www.space.com/19436-columbia-disaster.html. 11 Jake Parks, “How many astronauts have died in space?”, 20 October 2019, https://astronomy. com/news/2019/10/how-many-astronauts-have-died-in-space.

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away.12 For those lucky enough to be in close proximity to experience the launch in person, it was by all accounts a most memorable audible experience as well. An onlooker three kilometres from the launch site of a Saturn V (minimum distance to the launch pad used during the Apollo13 program) would have been subjected to more than 140 dB (average human ear pain threshold starts at 100 dB14 ) of sound and shockwaves strong enough to be felt physically.15 In December 2015 SpaceX successfully landed the first stage of an orbital class rocket that was used for a payload deployment mission and have subsequently steadily been building up an enviable track record of rocket landings, each of which become a spectacle in its own right.16 From the earliest of times, humans have had a special relationship with the night sky, the science of what we now know as astronomy, initially found its roots amongst the magicians and priests of the ancient world who studied the night sky. The practice was called astrology at the time, which was interwoven with the practical needs of society for example predicting seasonal change amongst others.17 Astronomy can therefore rightly considered to be the oldest defined field of formal scientific study, reflecting human development through deductions made about the universe by generations of observers staring at the same celestial canvas. As can be expected such a process was bound to create different points of view and multiple bodies of knowledge, which in turn was used to build theories and world views on which societies were built. A number of important reference works were thus produced, of which the Almagest of Ptolemy created in 150 of the Common Era (CE, or AD) is a most notable example.18 In this foundational work, Claudius Ptolemy from Alexandria put forward a treatise to describe the motions of celestial objects, which postulated a geocentric view; in which the Earth is the centre of the universe, a view perceived so solid that it became dogma for the following millennium.19 The exploration of the heavenly bodies continued to be a field of important study by different cultures as it served a dual role in all societies; on the one

12 NASA, “Apollo 17 Launch Operations”, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/SP-4204/ ch23-7.html. 13 NASA, “The Apollo Missions”, https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/apollo/missions/index. html. 14 Purdue University, “Noise Sources and Their Effects”, https://www.chem.purdue.edu/chemsa fety/Training/PPETrain/dblevels.htm. 15 Amy Shira Teitel, “How The Noise of Big Rockets Breaks Apart Buildings”, 10 October 2016, https://www.popsci.com/how-big-rockets-break-apart-buildings/#page-2. 16 Mike Wall, “Wow! SpaceX Lands Orbital Rocket Successfully in Historic First”, December 22, 2015. https://www.space.com/31420-spacex-rocket-landing-success.html. 17 Anton Pannekoek, “Astrology and its Influence upon the Development of Astronomy”, Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada 24, no. 59 (1930). 18 M.S. Mahoney, “Ptolemaic Astronomy in the Middle Ages”, https://www.princeton.edu/~hos/ mike/texts/ptolemy/ptolemy.html. 19 Frank J. Swetz, “Mathematical Treasure: Ptolemy’s Almagest”, https://www.maa.org/press/per iodicals/convergence/mathematical-treasure-ptolemy-s-almagest.

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hand a spiritual or religious component of most of the ancient religions and on the other a purely practical side, i.e. as navigation and timing tool.20 The positions of celestial objects played a very practical role in providing important practical information to the Islamic religion in particular; were the ability to correctly determine the direction of the halidom Mecca and appearance of the Moon to start a new calendar month plays a very important role.21 Subsequently with the rise of Islam as a prominent world religion spanning large areas of influence, the study of astronomy benefited accordingly, leading to important contributions most notably the publication of The Book of the Fixed Stars by Abd al-Rahman al-Sufi in approximately 964 CE which described and documented many star constellations.22 By the time Johannes Kepler was born on 27 December 1571 in the south of today’s Germany, astronomy was experiencing a golden age. It was the largest contributor to the scientific body of knowledge during the Renaissance, most notably the controversial heliocentric theory put forward in 1543 CE by Nicolaus Copernicus which placed the Sun at the centre of the universe with Earth revolving around it, challenging the thousand year existing Ptolemaic geocentric model.23 In this environment of ‘astronomical’ opportunity, Kepler becomes a noted astronomer adding an impressive list of ‘firsts’ to his name. He penned a number of significant publications in his lifetime; in the field of optics Astronomiae Pars Optica and Dioptrice, a discussion of some discoveries of Galileo in Dissertatio Cum Nuncio Sidereo and the history changing work in which the first two of his ‘laws’ were published—Astronomia Nova.24 Incidentally Kepler was also the first person to use the word ‘satellite’ in a pamphlet titled Narratio De Observatis A Se Quatuor Iovis Sattelitibus Erronibus.25 Perhaps today best known as the founder of celestial mechanics—literally the person who laid down the law on planetary motion, in what became known as ‘Kepler’s Three Laws’, the third and final being published in 1619 CE (refer Table 1.)26 The Three Laws do not only apply to planets but also to spacecraft and are used to calculate the orbits of satellites and other spacecraft using the same principles. By applying the same laws laid down 400 years ago, modern space mission

20

Gustav-Adolph Schoener, “Astrology: Between religion and the empirical”, Esoterica IV (2002); pp.29–60. 21 Monica Rius,”Finding the Sacred Direction: Medieval Books on the Qibla “, Cosmology across Cultures, vol. 409, p. 177, 2009. 22 Ihsan Hafez, “Abd al-Rahman al-Sufi and his book of the fixed stars: a journey of re-discovery”, https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2010PhDT.295H/abstract. 23 Sheila Rabin, “Nicolaus Copernicus”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Fall 2019 Edition, Edward N. Zalta (ed.), https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2019/entries/copernicus/. 24 Daniel A. Di Liscia. “Johannes Kepler.” Edited by Edward N. Zalta. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, no. Fall 2019 Edition (2019). 25 NASA. “A List of Kepler’s Firsts”, https://www.nasa.gov/kepler/education/johannes#anchor 784359. 26 Jack J Lissauer, “In Retrospect: Kepler’s Astronomia Nova”, 9 December 2009, https://www.nat ure.com/articles/462725a.

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Table 1 Kepler’s three laws of planetary motion The three laws of Kepler 1

The planets move around the Sun in ellipses with the Sun at one focus

2

The line connecting the Sun to a planet sweeps equal areas in equal times

3

The square of the orbital period of a planet is proportional to the cube (3rd power) of the mean distance from the Sun

Table 2 The Laws of Newton laying the foundation of modern rockets science Newton’s laws Newton’s three laws of motion 1

Objects at rest will stay at rest and objects in motion will stay in motion in a straight line unless acted upon by an unbalanced force

2

Force is equal to mass times acceleration

3

For every action there is always an opposite and equal reaction

Law of Universal Gravitation Any particle of matter in the universe attracts any other with a force varying directly as the product of the masses and inversely as the square of the distance between them

designers refer to it to describe the shape of an orbit, account for any speed variation of the object during orbit and determine how long an object will take to complete its individual orbit.27 These three laws instituted a fundamental change in the prevailing direction of thinking at the time; as it confirmed the heliocentric view of Copernicus and as such steers astronomy in a new direction. In 1687 CE Sir Isaac Newton published his ‘Laws of Motion’28 and the ‘Law of Universal Gravitation’29 in Philsophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (refer Table 2), laying the foundations for modern rocket theory. In the early twentieth century Russian visionary Konstantin Tsiolkovsky built on the foundations laid by all the astronomers who preceded him, by creating a practical ‘recipe’ simply called the ‘Tsiolkovsky formula’. This equation could be used to accurately predict the power requirements of a rocket; essentially enabling the future human ‘jump’ to space.30 As a rocket is constantly depleting its propellant when it burns, the constantly changing mass needs to be taking into account, known as the ‘ideal rocket equation’ (refer Eq. 1), it defines the relationships

27

Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, “Kepler’s Laws of Orbital Motion”, https://how thingsfly.si.edu/flight-dynamics/kepler%E2%80%99s-laws-orbital-motion. 28 Smithsonian Institute, “Newton’s Laws of Motion—The Rules of the Cosmic Road”, https://how thingsfly.si.edu/flight-dynamics/newton%E2%80%99s-laws-motion. 29 The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica, “Newton’s law of gravitation”, 1998, https://www.bri tannica.com/science/Newtons-law-of-gravitation. 30 NASA, “Konstantin E. Tsiolkovsky”, 22 September 2010, https://www.nasa.gov/audience/for educators/rocketry/home/konstantin-tsiolkovsky.html.

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required between the speed of the vehicle, the exhaust velocity of the exit gas, the mass of the rocket and the propellant itself. This Tsiolkovsky Rocket Equation was published first in a Russian magazine in 1903.31 Equation 1 Tsiolkovsky Rocket Equation.   Minitial (1) V = ve . ln M f inal V = change in velocity. ve = exhaust velocity at nozzle exit. Minitial = initial total mass the including propellant i.e. the ‘wet mass’. Mfinal = final total after propellant has been expended i.e. the ‘dry mass’. His work laid the foundation for the pioneers of rocketry that were to follow, the designers and draftsmen who for the next six decades would continue to evolve the rocket into a practical launch vehicle for an emerging spacefaring species. On July 16th, 1969 at 08:32 Eastern Standard Time (EST), a Saturn V32 (in 2021 still the most powerful rocket built) launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida, USA, carrying the first human mission to the Moon.33 It took only two-and-a-half minutes to reach an altitude of 60 km, another six minutes later the second stage took the payload of the Apollo 1134 mission to an altitude of 185 km; well over the imaginary Kármán Line defining the boundary to outer space.35 Four days later, just after 13:00 h (EST), the continued process of successive discoveries over many centuries culminated in what could probably be considered one of the greatest achievements of humanity, as the first humans set foot on another celestial object—the Moon.36 The aim of this work is to investigate how the rocket had evolved from its origins in ancient China as a weapon of war to become the quintessential symbol of space exploration and the role science fiction had played in this process. Divided into three main sections; the first section provides an overview of the evolution of the rocket, the second looks at related launch vehicles in science fiction, its origins and its inspirational role in shaping the development of the rocket. Before concluding, the third and final section presents the reader with aspects of the ‘science fiction view’ of rocket technology and how it matches up with reality.

31

David Shortt, “Learn the rocket equation, part 1”, 28 April 2017, https://www.planetary.org/art icles/20170428-the-rocket-equation-part-1. 32 NASA, “What Was the Saturn V?”, 17 September 2010, https://www.nasa.gov/audience/forstu dents/5-8/features/nasa-knows/what-was-the-saturn-v-58.html. 33 NASA, “Apollo 11 Mission Overview”, https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/apollo/missions/ apollo11.html. 34 Ibid. 35 Nadia Drake, “Where, exactly, is the edge of space? It depends on who you ask”, 20 December 2018, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2018/12/where-is-the-edge-of-space-andwhat-is-the-karman-line/. 36 N. Wolchover, “’One Small Step for Man’: Was Neil Armstrong Misquoted?”, https://www. space.com/17307-neil-armstrong-one-small-step-quote.html.

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Fig. 1 The ‘Aeolipile’ of Heron. (Graphic courtesy of the author)

4.2

History of Rockets

In the 1960 October Edition of the magazine Missiles and Rockets then future President of the USA John F. Kennedy made the following statement: “This is the new age of exploration; space is our great New Frontier.”37 If space was the new frontier then the rocket was the means to get there. Rockets have been in existence in one way or the other since ancient times, the first description of what is considered as a rocket dates back to ancient China after the invention of ‘blackpowder’, though the propulsion principle has been documented long before that. The principle of heating a liquid to produce motion was formally demonstrated by Heron of Alexandria as early as the first century CE using a device called an ‘Aeolipile’, which worked on the same principle as rocket propulsion i.e. the ‘action—reaction’ principle.38 The ‘Aeolipile’ consisted out of a metal container filled with water, out of which protruded two oppositely positioned tubes bent at the end to serve as ‘nozzles’ through which hot steam generated when placed above a heat source, would exit to produce a pivotal rotation, as depicted in Fig. 1. According to the Collins dictionary, the word rocket entered the English language in the seventeenth century and comes from the French ‘roquette’ which in turn has its own origin in the Italian word ‘rocchetta,’ used to describe a ‘selfpropelling cylinder.’ Another version claims that the word ‘rocchetta’ was used

37

John F. Kennedy, “If the Soviets Control Space… They Can Control Earth”, MISSILES AND ROCKETS, 7, no. 15 (October 10, 1960); pp. 12–13. 38 Paul Tasch, “Conservation of Momentum in Antiquity. A Note on the Prehistory of the Principle of Jet-Propulsion”, Isis 43, no. 3 (1952); pp. 251–252.

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by a fourteenth century Italian artificer named Murtatori, to describe blackpowder propelled ‘fire arrows’ used during medieval times.39,40 The aforementioned use of the rocket as an instrument of war is probably the most likely, as since the discovery that blackpowder could be used to propel an object, the concept was used in the theatre of war throughout the ages; the modern nuclear warhead armed intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), representing the pinnacle of this evolution. Blackpowder was invented around the ninth century in China where it was used to make fireworks and rockets. Ironically although it is also called ‘gunpowder’ the gun as such was only invented much later in the fourteenth century; so the rocket preceded the gun as instrument of war.41 Rockets as weapons of war made their official debut in 1232 CE when an invading Mongol army was repelled by the Chinese defenders during the ‘Battle of Kai-Fung-Fu’ assisted by the use of ‘fire arrows’, an incendiary weapon used to incinerate the battle ground occupied by the enemy from afar.42 Consisting of a simple tube capped on one end and propelled by the thrust produced by the rapid burning of the blackpowder on the opposing open end, it was launched in the direction of the enemy where on contact with anything flammable it did its incendiary damage. For the next couple of centuries, the rocket continued to be used mostly as vehicle for fireworks and still as a low-grade weapon of war. In the latter eighteenth century the army of Hyder Ali, the Prince of Mysore, started to use a much more advanced rocket with great accuracy against the soldiers of the East India Company.43 So great was the effect of these iron-cased rockets, which weighed between two and five kilograms, with a reported range of almost two-and-a-half kilometres, that it greatly contributed to the defeat of the British at the ‘Battle of Pollilur’ by causing the explosion of the British ammunition stores in September 1780 CE.44 Due to the apparent success of the deployed rockets, the British military took interest in the Mysore technology and developed their own version of a metal clad rocket called the Congreve rocket, named after its designer William Congreve.45 This new weapon was adopted into the British military and was used in many famous battles amongst them the defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo. Since the rockets had no recoil they were well suited for naval attack such as the 1812

39

Ian Brookes, “We take a look at the etymology behind the word ’rocket’ and it’s Italian origins”, 13 January 2017, https://www.collinsdictionary.com/word-lovers-blog/new/we-take-a-look-at-theetymology-behind-the-word-rocket-and-its-italian-origins,345,HCB.html. 40 University of Oregon, “This New Ocean: The History of Space Flight”, http://abyss.uoregon. edu/~js/space/lectures/lec01.html. 41 The Royal Society of Chemistry, “About blackpowder”, https://www.rsc.org/Education/Tea chers/Resources/Contemporary/student/pop_blackpowder.html. 42 NASA, “Rockets as Weapons—13th Through 16th Centuries”, https://www.grc.nasa.gov/www/ k-12/rocket/BottleRocket/13thru16.htm. 43 Materia Islamica, “Battle of Pollilur (1780)”, http://materiaislamica.com/index.php/Battle_of_ Pollilur_(1780). 44 Ibid. 45 Simon Werrett, “William Congreve’s rational rockets”, Notes and Records of the Royal Society 63, no. 1 (2009); pp. 35–56.

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war between the British Empire and the USA during the ‘Battle of Fort McHenry’, making such an impression on the composer Frances Scott Keys, who was present during attack, he immortalised its role in the words of the US national anthem; “And the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air, gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.”46 Where Congreve failed to get rid of the hallmark heavy stabilising stick of the rockets used during the era, William Hale succeeded in 1844 CE. He successfully patented a rocket which used the rockets’ exhaust to drive rotating metal vanes which served as the required stabilising force, thus eliminating the need for a stabilising stick. This invention was a major step forward in rocket design, though the greatest advance in rocket development were not to come from England but from Imperial Russia.47 Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky was born in 1857 CE, a gifted conceptual thinker inspired by the publications of Jules Verne and a writer of science fiction himself, he firmly believed in the concept of humanity ultimately leaving the Earth and settling the universe. Tsiolkovsky saw the rocket as the enabling mechanism to allow humans to leave the confines of Earth, as he calculated that the acceleration forces involved in the cannon launch method of the Moon capsule as described by Jules Verne in From the Earth to the Moon, would not be a viable method as indeed it would have been deadly to the passengers.48 By the time Tsiolkovsky published his now famous ‘rocket formula’ in 1903 rightly earning him the honorary title of ‘grandfather of rocketry,’ solid fuelled rockets were a relatively well developed technology.49 The visionary Tsiolkovsky put forward many futuristic sounding space related ideas during his time amongst others; the concept of liquid fuelled rockets and importantly the idea to use multistage rockets, incidentally he is also credited with coming up with the notion of a ‘space elevator’ as early as 1895.50 For his contribution to the development of the space industry a large impact crater on the far side of the Moon was named in his honour.51 Though he never built an actual rocket Tsiolkovsky’s work paved the way for the first practical rocket

46

Frank Winter, “The Rockets That Inspired Francis Scott Key”, September 2014, https://www.air spacemag.com/history-of-flight/rockets-inspired-francis-scott-key-180952399/. 47 Anatoly Zak, “The Congreve missiles”, http://www.russianspaceweb.com/congreve.html. 48 Nola Taylor Redd, “Konstantin Tsiolkovsky: Russian Father of Rocketry”, 27 February 2013, https://www.space.com/19994-konstantin-tsiolkovsky.html. 49 NASA, “Konstantin E. Tsiolkovsky”, 22 September 2010, https://www.nasa.gov/audience/for educators/rocketry/home/konstantin-tsiolkovsky.html. 50 Morgan McFall-Johnsen, “A giant elevator could connect Earth to space using current technology, experts say—here’s how that might work”, https://www.businessinsider.co.za/space-elevatoron-Earth-moon-2019-9?r=US&IR=T. 51 NASA, “Konstantin E. Tsiolkovsky”, 22 September 2010, https://www.nasa.gov/audience/for educators/rocketry/home/konstantin-tsiolkovsky.html.

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design pioneers in the form of American Robert Goddard52 and German Hermann Oberth.53 The American Robert Hutchings Goddard was born in 1882, and is best known as the designer and builder of the first rocket powered by liquid fuel; a combination of liquid oxygen and ordinary car fuel, though it only reached an altitude of twelve meters, it did prove the concept in 1926.54 But why was the liquid fuelled rocket of such importance? To answer that question one needs to look at the basic design of a ‘rocket motor’, which in essence consists out a suitable fuel source and a supply of oxygen which are mixed together and combusted causing an explosion. The explosion in turn produces a hot exhaust gas which is directed through a nozzle creating thrust resulting in the movement of the rocket, which in turn is a function of the combustion reaction efficiency.55 When rocket engines are evaluated for efficiency it is by measuring the ‘specific impulse’ a term referring to the thrust produced per mass unit of propellant consumed per time unit and is measured in seconds; the higher the specific impulse value the more efficient the engine.56 At the time up and to Goddard’s liquid fuel experiment, all rockets where propelled by a solid fuel which contained its own oxidizer, in the case of gunpowder it is Potassium Nitrate (KNO3 ) commonly known as saltpetre. Goddard a trained physicist believed that liquid fuelled rockets would be more efficient than the gunpowder versions of his day and in addition, an aspect of thrust control could be introduced by controlling the rate of fuel flow to the combustion chamber, and this ability brought with it an invaluable advantage.57 Perhaps lesser known, he was also responsible for proving a rocket can operate in vacuum in 1916 dispelling the long held notion that rockets needed air to be able to function. A prolific inventor by the time of his death in 1945 he held 214 rocketry patents.58 Robert Goddard was a pioneer who was perhaps misunderstood and never saw the true impact of his work. He was a pragmatist when it came to the realities of pioneering work in a world of preconceived ideas, sadly popular culture at the time was not on his side as reflected in this statement he made in 1920; “Every vision is a joke until the first man accomplishes it; once realized, it becomes commonplace.”59 Known as the ‘Father of Space Travel’ Hermann Julius Oberth was born in modern day Romania in 1894 and was the only one of the three space pioneers

52

David Shortt, “Learn the rocket equation, part 1”, 28. April 2017, https://www.planetary.org/art icles/20170428-the-rocket-equation-part-1. 53 Hermann-Oberth-Raumfahrt-Museum, “The Hermann Oberth Raumfahrt Museum”, http:// www.oberth-museum.org/index_e.html. 54 Michael Neufeld, “Robert Goddard and the First Liquid-Propellant Rocket”, 16 March 2016, https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/robert-goddard-and-first-liquid-propellant-rocket 55 NASA, “Propulsion Systems”, https://history.nasa.gov/conghand/propulsn.htm. 56 Ibid. 57 Frank H. Winter, “The Misunderstood Professor”, Air and Space Magazine, May 2008. 58 Space Center Houston, “Flashback Friday: Goddard launches first liquid-fuel rocket in 1926”, https://spacecenter.org/rocket-man/ 59 Today in Science History, “Science Quotes by Robert Goddard”, https://todayinsci.com/G/God dard_Robert/GoddardRobert-Quotations.htm.

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mentioned, to see humanity actually breach the space frontier; both Tsiolkovsky and Goddard passing away too early.60 An ethnic German he started studying medicine at the University of Munich just before the breakout of World War I in 1913. He subsequently joined the army during the war, a period in which he became interested in rocketry and submitted a design of a rocket weapon to the German war department to be used as a long range weapon, an idea which was rejected.61 Ironically it was to be the resurrection of the very same idea about two decades later that inspired the creation of the V-2 liquid fuelled rocket, which was to set in motion a cascade of events that would lead to the era of human space exploration. The V-2 represented a number of ‘firsts’ for rocket technology, it was the first ‘large-scale’ liquid fuelled rocket in the world; had the capability of carrying a one-tonne warhead over 300 km and could be launched from mobile platforms.62 In essence the V-2 represented the dualism of rocket technology perfectly on the one hand as the worlds’ first ballistic missile it was the technological blueprint for future nuclear ICBMs, yet on the other hand it also inspired the Saturn V that would carry the Apollo payloads to the moon. One of the key engineers involved with the V-2 weapon program with Oberth was Wernher von Braun who helped Oberth build his first rocket in 1931.63 Von Braun was inspired into rocketry originally by Oberth’s book—Die Rakete zu den Planetenräumen, loosely translated as ‘The Rocket into Interplanetary Space’ was to become the chief architect of the Saturn V rocket that would carry the Apollo astronauts to the Moon.64 As homage to his contribution, the ‘Oberth effect’65 was named after him; an interesting effect observed when a rocket traveling in space, gains the most kinetic energy if the engine is ignited when the craft is at its fastest point in orbit. Oberth passed away in 1989 just over two decades after attending the launch of Apollo 11 in person. Perhaps best remembered for bringing insight into rocket dynamics thus paving the way for the modern space program, there were other earlier visionary ideas as well; including the concept of a space station and a telescope in orbit, both of which became a reality eventually.66 Currently most liquid fuelled rockets follows the original design of Goddard where the oxidiser and the fuel is held in separate containers and then reacted in the

60

Cliff Lethbridge, “Hermann Oberth”, https://www.spaceline.org/history/25.html. Encyclopedia.com, “Hermann Oberth”, https://www.encyclopedia.com/people/science-and-tec hnology/space-exploration-biographies/hermann-julius-oberth. 62 National Air and Space Museum, “V-2 Missile”, https://airandspace.si.edu/collection-objects/v2-missile/nasm_A19600342000. 63 Carolyn Collins Petersen, “The Life and Legacy of Hermann Oberth, German Rocket Theorist”, 3 July 2019, https://www.thoughtco.com/biography-hermann-oberth-4165552. 64 Alex Hollings, “The Saturn V Story: From Nazi Roots to America’s Moon Rocket”, 16 July 2019, https://www.popularmechanics.com/space/rockets/a26013658/saturn-v-rocket-wernhervon-braun/ 65 Philip Rodriguez Blanco and Carl E. Mungan, “Rocket Propulsion, Classical Relativity, and the Oberth Effect”, The Physics Teacher 57, no. 7 (2019): 439–441. 66 Carolyn Collins Petersen, “The Life and Legacy of Hermann Oberth, German Rocket Theorist”, 3 July 2019, https://www.thoughtco.com/biography-hermann-oberth-4165552. 61

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Fig. 2 Diagram of solid and liquid rocket engines. (Graphic courtesy of the author)

combustion chamber, known as a ‘bipropellant’ rocket (refer Fig. 2). Incidentally there are also ‘monopropellant’ liquid fuelled rockets. In the last mentioned type of rocket, thrust is developed resulting from a rapid decomposition of a single fuel source when reacted with a catalyst; Hydrogen Peroxide (H2 O2 ) reacted with a Platinum catalyst (Pt) being the typical example, with the reaction producing hot steam and oxygen. These low specific impulse efficiency systems are useful in various control related applications.67 In a solid fuelled rocket the ‘burn time’ i.e. the period that it takes for the rocket to consume its propellant is determined by the amount of available material and once it is ignited the process cannot be stopped. A distinct advantage solid fuel rockets have over their liquid-fuelled counterparts is the fact that the solid fuel is very stable and thus a rocket can be stored for long periods of time after which it can still be used reliably; making it ideal for strategic military applications such as nuclear ICBM’s which by default will be kept in storage for an indefinite period of time.68 According to the office of the European Space Agency (ESA) in charge of space debris, as of September 20th, 2021 approximately 6110 successful rocket launches have taken place since the launch of Sputnik in 1957.69 Liquid and solid fuel rocket technology can also be used to complement each other, the NASA ‘Space Shuttle’ program as such was a good example of the

67

NASA, “Propulsion Systems”, https://history.nasa.gov/conghand/propulsn.htm. Joe Pappalardo, “The Rocket Fuel Rivalry Shaping the Future of Spaceflight”, 10 April 2018, https://www.popularmechanics.com/space/rockets/a19724715/liquid-solid-rocket-fuel-spacex-orb ital-atk-blue-origin/ 69 ESA, “Space debris by the numbers”, 20 September 2021, www.esa.int/Safety_Security/Space_ Debris/Space_debris_by_the_numbers 68

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hybrid use of solid and liquid fuel rocket technology. A space shuttle orbiter resembled an aeroplane with wings and a rudder; this configuration allowed it to glide down to the surface landing like a conventional aeroplane on re-entering the atmosphere of Earth. On launch the orbiter was mounted on top of a giant liquid fuel tank which provided the necessary fuel to the rocket engines of the shuttle orbiter itself which would launch the craft into orbit assisted by two solid fuel booster rockets. The solid fuel boosters detached from the main configuration after just two minutes and we these were subsequently recovered for re-use, whilst the discarded main fuel tank would burn up in the Earth’s atmosphere after it was jettisoned.70 One common interest that the three original rocket pioneers discussed in this section shared was an interest in science fiction. All three mentioned inspiration derived from science fiction playing a role in igniting their interest in space and subsequently rocketry. It is said that Robbert Goddard got the idea to go to space inspired by the science fiction he read in his late teens such as Garrett P. Serviss’s (generally considered to be the originator of the ‘space opera’ genre) Edison’s Conquest of Mars which was published in serialized form in the Boston Post; envisioning an interplanetary spacecraft that could be used to travel to Mars.71 Both Tsiolkovsky and Oberth had indicated their interest in space were inspired by the works of prolific French writer Jules Verne, most notably the 1865 novel From the Earth to the Moon.72 As such science fiction played an important role in the development in space to quote Konstantin Tsiolkovsky—“First, inevitably, the idea, the fantasy, the fairy tale. Then, scientific calculation. Ultimately, fulfilment crowns the dream.”73 The following section aims to provide a short overview regarding the origins of science fiction and how even the first work had a link to space, with its writer rooted firmly in astronomy.

4.3

Science Fiction and Space

The word ‘Science Fiction’ conjures up as many ideas in as many minds which cares to pay attention to the subject at any point in time, perhaps thus a good point of departure is to find a definition to frame what constitutes science fiction? Three popular reference dictionaries of the English language have the following to say on the subject (Table 3): For the purposes of this work the Oxford definition is probably most appropriate, though there may be one additional consideration, namely; the imagined

70 Flint Wild, “What Was the Space Shuttle? “, 7June 2021, https://www.nasa.gov/audience/forstu dents/k-4/stories/nasa-knows/what-is-the-space-shuttle-k4.html. 71 Cornell University, “Garrett P. Serviss, Science Fiction Pioneer”, https://olinuris.library.cornell. edu/parallax/serviss/pioneer. 72 Michael Benson, “Science Fiction Sent Man to the Moon”, New York Times, 20 July 2019. 73 Todayinsci.com, “Science Quotes by Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky”, https://todayinsci. com/T/Tsiolkovsky_Konstantin/TsiolkovskyKonstantin-Quotations.htm.

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Table 3 Science fiction—three sources, three definitions Reference

Definition

Cambridge Dictionary

“A type of writing about imagined developments in science and their effect on life especially in the future.”74

Merriam-Webster Dictionary

“Fiction dealing principally with the impact of actual or imagined science on society or individuals or having a scientific factor as an essential orienting component.”75

Oxford Dictionary

“A type of book, film, etc. that is based on imagined scientific discoveries of the future, and often deals with space travel and life on other planets.”76

future needs to be somehow relatable to a contemporary audience in terms of aspects familiar to their ‘current’ era—or it might risk being lost in abstraction. Enter the three laws of Arthur C. Clarke. Arthur C. Clarke was arguably one of the most innovative science fiction writers to have traversed the space genre and understood the point of believable technology particularly well.77 Perhaps best known in the popular mind for the classic 2001 A Space Odyssey a novel developed concurrently with director of the cinematic version Stanley Kubrick.78 The film released in 1968 explored a range of science fiction topics such as space travel and habitation, the concept of a rogue Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the origins of humanity to name a few. It is generally considered as a defining work in science fiction cinema. Though Clarke was already famous for his essay imaging the concept of the communications satellite in geosynchronous orbit published in 1945, he is also known for his ‘Three Laws’ (refer Table 4) which strongly hints at the necessity to move past the current convention when peering into the future, something he was particularly apt at in retrospect.79,80 Clarke’s ‘third law’ is probably the most important to take note of for the science fiction creator when considering an audience. The work albeit a speculation

74

Cambridge Dictionary, “Meaning of science fiction in English”, https://dictionary.cambridge. org/dictionary/english/science-fiction. 75 Merriam-Webster Dictionary. “Science Fiction”, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ science%20fiction. 76 Oxford Learner’s Dictionary, “Definition of science fiction noun from the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary”, https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/definition/english/science-fic tion. 77 The Editors Biography.com, “Arthur C. Clarke Biography”, https://www.biography.com/writer/ arthur-c-clarke. 78 Stanley Kubrick and Arthur Charles Clarke. 2001: a Space Odyssey: Dialogue Cutting Continuity. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 1968. 79 Arthur C. Clarke, “The Space-Station: Its Radio Applications,” Wireless World, (1945) 305–308. 80 Donna Lu, “Clarke’s three laws”, New Scientist https://www.newscientist.com/term/clarkesthree-laws/

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Table 4 Arthur C. Clarke’s three laws of discovery The Three Laws of Arthur C. Clarke 1

“When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.”

2

“The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.”

3

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

about ‘a future still to come’, still needs to be anchored into the technological zeitgeist of its time; the target audience must somehow be able to connect the future activity described by the author in terms of a similar even vaguely relatable one in the current society. To elaborate on the previous point, take the following example; A science fiction writer during the first industrial revolution wanting to describe the use of a personal communication device between individuals, might have had a hard time describing the concept of what we know today as a mobile phone in terms of technology; as at the time in the common view there was really nothing to relate to it. Both telephone and radio was still to be invented and electricity was but a curious phenomenon relegated to the attention of a small group of scientists. However if the writer chose to describe such a device in terms of function rather, as an instrument with the ability to be commanded at will to ferry messages between individuals, it could be described in relatable technology. With that in mind thus if the writer suggested a personal mechanical messenger pigeon which could be used as message carrier between different people it would be quite believable, as the use of homing pigeons as means of communication was well established. So too was the concept of mechanical ‘Automatons’, a collective term essentially describing any device functioning automatically, typically these devices mimicked aspects of life.81 As a point of interest the first automaton, legend has it, was in actual fact a flying dove; designed by Archytas of Tarentum a mathematician in ancient Greece around 350 BCE. It was constructed out of wood and presumably using steam power, it was capable of flying a couple of hundred meters, incidentally demonstrating the rocket principle before Heron.82

Clarke’s third law was in a sense used by Johannes Kepler83 well before it was formulated when Kepler wrote Somnium Sive Astronomia Lunaris Joannis Kepleri, generally considered the first published work of science fiction.84 Though the lack of technology precluded any such activity during Kepler’s lifetime, it did not prevent him from imagining what it would like to be to visit the Moon, and as such the first written science fiction work was born. In 1634 four years after the death

81

Stephen Cave, Kanta Dihal, “Ancient dreams of intelligent machines: 3,000 years of robots”, 25 July 2018, https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-05773-y. 82 Jimmy Stamp, “A Brief History of Robot Birds”, 22 May 2013, https://www.smithsonianmag. com/arts-culture/a-brief-history-of-robot-birds-77235415/ 83 Nola Taylor Redd, “Johannes Kepler: Unlocking the Secrets of Planetary Motion”, 20 November 2017, https://www.space.com/15787-johannes-kepler.html. 84 Project, Somnium, “Kepler’s Somnium—the first science fiction story?”, https://somniumpr oject.wordpress.com/

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of Kepler’s the manuscript Somnium Sive Astronomia Lunaris Joannis Kepleri was finally published by his child.85 Albeit not generally well-known, translations of the original work is readily available today, in English known as The Dream of Lunar Astronomy by Johannes Kepler. Though the book, thirty seven years in the making, was Kepler’s last work to a certain extent it was also the first, as it traced back to ideas formulated whilst still a student at the Tübingen University.86 It still remains a significant work from a science fiction point of view as it touched on a number of interesting concepts especially taking into account the time it was written. Kepler as the first science fiction writer essentially used this work of fantasy to speculate about scientific theory which was considered contra to the accepted dogma at the time, by exploring an opposing and very different version, albeit in a body of fiction. Kepler’s story—touched on a number of subjects which at the time could definitely have been considered risqué such as mentioning of the occult—is essentially about the quest of knowledge. The story revolves around a character Duracotus described as an Icelandic fisherman, who went to study astronomy under Tycho Brahe. Now Tycho Brahe was an actual person, of Danish nobility born in 1546 who ran an observatory on the island of Hven situated between Denmark and Sweden practicing astronomy and also dabbling in alchemy.87,88 Brahe was in actual fact also Kepler’s real-life employer, Kepler being employed as an assistant, it was Brahe’s astronomical observation notes that supported the formulation of the famous Kepler laws. The story continues with the main character eventually returning home, where his mother introduces him to her teacher, a ‘daemon’ who has the know-how to travel through space. It is important to note that the word ‘daemon’ in the Renaissance era typically referred to some kind of a spiritual being that could be controlled through magic.89 Incidentally the word ‘daemon’ is still commonly used in UNIX-type computer operating systems where it refers to a background process waiting to be activated.90 The entity in Kepler’s work is a daemon who hails from Levania the name which the inhabitants calls the Earth Moon and described as located about 50.000 ‘German miles’91 above Earth, a distance of roughly 389.000 km; a fairly accurate description of the actual distance between the Earth and the Moon. There is no spacecraft involved per se, but rather a super natural process where the travellers are instantly transferred from

85

BBVA., “Kepler, the Father of Science Fiction”, 16 November 2015, https://www.bbvaopenm ind.com/en/science/leading-figures/kepler-the-father-of-science-fiction/ 86 Project, Somnium, “Kepler’s Somnium—the first science fiction story?”, https://somniumpr oject.wordpress.com/ 87 Skåne. “Visit the Island of Ven”, https://visitskane.com/classic-attractions/visit-island-ven. 88 Rice, “Tycho Brahe (1546–1601)”, http://galileo.rice.edu/sci/brahe.html. 89 HWS, “Renaissance Magic, Medicine & Alchemy”, http://people.hws.edu/gfrost-arnold/MMS lecture6.htm. 90 The Linux Information Project, “Daemon Definition”, http://www.linfo.org/daemon.html. 91 Kartenmeister, “Measurements”, http://www.kartenmeister.com/preview/html/measurements__ coinage.html.

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the Earth to the Moon, similar to the “Beam me up, Scotty” process featured in the Star Trek series.92 What is interesting is the attributes that a traveller needs to possess to survive the demanding journey to the Moon, such as physical fitness not dissimilar to those demanded of the modern astronaut. The physical nature of the journey is described as the travellers being subjected to “a strong pressure, not unlike an explosion of gunpowder”, as they are “hurled above the mountains and the seas”, and a potion is administered prior to the journey in order to relax the body and prevent mortal injury. After landing ‘softly’ on the Moon the body of the human traveller required a period of recuperation before regaining the ability to walk again, hinting at the demanding nature of the passage. Once on the Moon the travellers and the local inhabitants can observe Volva (the Earth) and the movement of all the other planets from their vantage point with ease. In this work Kepler is blending aspects of reality with fiction, so very characteristic of the science fiction genre of today which gives the story an aspect of relatable believability to engage the reader. Science fiction writer and astronomer Garrett Putman Serviss in Edison’s Conquest of Mars took the concept even further by integrating into the plot, in addition to the famous inventor mentioned in the title, many other contemporary ‘celebrities’ including scientist Lord Kelvin and almost every other period prominent political figure of influence including Queen Victoria, Czar Nicholas and even with Serviss himself a prominent character in the book.93 In terms of moderns science fiction Kepler’s work did present a dilemma, as such that no described mechanism was involved in transferring the passengers from the Earth to the Moon the technology simply being described as ‘magic’ in line with Arthur C. Clarke’s third law. Subsequent works of science fiction by writers post Kepler; however, did find a mechanism to get the human space traveller off terra firma, the chosen means being rocket power. The first description of a rocket as mechanism empowering human flight, harks back to sixteenth century folklore when Wan-Hu a Chinese official who wanted to travel to the stars constructed a craft for the very purpose; consisting of a structure hosting two large kites underneath was attached a chair for the ‘astronaut.’ It was powered by forty-seven rockets and so the story goes, after this rocket battery was ignited Wan-Hu disappeared into legend never to be seen again.94 Savinien Cyrano de Bergerac was a seventeenth century French writer known primarily for satirical works revisited the concept in L’Autre monde ou les états et empires de la Lune, one of the earliest works of science fiction post Kepler. In this tale a traveller named Cyrano, undertakes a successful journey to the Moon using a fireworks rocket powered space craft.95 When looking at early

92

Allan Asherman, The Star Trek Compendium, (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1981). Garrett Putman Serviss, Edison’s Conquest of Mars. (Urbana: Project Gutenberg, 2006), www. gutenberg.org/ebooks/#19141 94 , Louis de Gouyon Matignon, “Wan Hu, the Chinese astronaut”, 26 June 2019, https://www.spa celegalissues.com/wan-hu-the-chinese-astronaut/ 95 Cyrano De Bergerac, A Voyage to The Moon, (New work: Doubleday and McClure Co, 1899), https://www.gutenberg.org/files/46547/46547-h/46547-h.htm. 93

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science fiction, no overview regardless of depth can be regarded as complete without including a reference to Jules Verne perhaps the original ‘master’ of science fiction.

4.3.1

Jules Verne—Space Inspirator

On 8 February 1828 Jules Gabriel Verne, destined to become one of the most prolific writers in history, was born in the French town of Nantes.96 Verne though his true vocation was to be a writer, did not originally pursue the path, after studying law, a brief career of broker on the Paris stock exchange followed before switching to full time writing in 1852.97 A very productive writer producing over sixty books, most of which initially began life as ‘serials,’ i.e. weekly instalments in magazines, before being published as completed books.98 According to UNESCO statistics Verne is second only to Agatha Christie when it comes to the original works translated.99 The Voyages Extraordinaires100 series of books made up the bulk of Verne’s life’s work, these amazing tales followed a winning formula, featuring adventure filled journeys to extraordinary destinations enabled by fantastic machines. Probably his major role as ‘Space Inspirator’ to the likes of Tsiolkovsky and Oberth can be traced back to the epic work published in 1865 in French as De la Terre à la Lune which ironically enough did not involve a rocket. Better known in English as From the Earth to the Moon or The Baltimore Gun Club, the work describes how members of the Baltimore gun club devised a plan to literally shoot humans into space using a very large cannon called a Columbiad.101 The actual spacecraft is described as resembling a very large cannon shell which makes perfect sense taking into account the method of propulsion. Constructed out of aluminium the vehicle could accommodate three space-farers; who gained access by ascending the craft using a ladder before entering through a hatch situated towards the apex of the craft, as illustrated in Fig. 3.102 The original book only dealt with the actual launch into space and readers had to wait almost five years for a conclusion to the adventure. A follow-up book published in 1870, simply called Around

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Famous Authors, “Jules Verne”, https://www.famousauthors.org/jules-verne. The Editors Biography.com, “Jules Verne Biography”, https://www.biography.com/writer/julesverne. 98 Arthur B. Evans, “Jules Verne”, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jules-Verne. 99 UNESCO, “Index Translationum”, http://www.unesco.org/xtrans/bsstatexp.aspx?crit1L=5& nTyp=min&topN=50. 100 Goodreads, “Jules Verne’s Voyages Extraordinaires”, https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/ 138053.Jules_Verne_s_Voyages_Extraordinaires. 101 Kathleen Kuiper, “From the Earth to the Moon”, https://www.britannica.com/topic/From-theEarth-to-the-Moon-novel-by-Verne. 102 Jules Verne, From the Earth to the Moon. Fourth. Translated by Lowell Blair, (New York: Penguin Random House, 1865/2008). 97

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Fig. 3 Artistic interpretation of the spacecraft described by Jules Verne. (Graphic courtesy of the author)

the Moon, describes in detail the actual journey to the Moon undertaken by the adventurers and their subsequent return to Earth.103 A couple of interesting points to note; similar to the Verne spacecraft, aluminium also was the material primarily used in the construction of the Apollo 11 command and service module which also had a crew of three, was also launched from Florida and the crew retrieved by a US Navy vessel after the craft ‘splashed down’ in the ocean on its return to Earth.104 Interestingly enough in the book the project is described as a partnership between the government of the USA and private individuals i.e. a very early public–private space venture, of which there are a number of examples currently; the International Space Station (ISS) and SpaceX Crew Dragon amongst others. In Verne’s extensive body of work in addition to the remarkable machines the characters were transported in, a number of other technology driven activities are also described which actually found its way into practical reality (described in Table 5).105,106 Verne never actually described rocket powered spaceflight in any work, that idea is nowadays credited to a relatively unknown Canadian called William Leitch

103

Ted Gioia, “Around the Moon”, http://www.conceptualfiction.com/around_the_moon.html. NASA, “Jules Verne Space Book Gallery”, https://er.jsc.nasa.gov/seh/vernorig.html. 105 National Geographic, “8 Jules Verne Inventions That Came True”, 8 Februray 2011, https:// www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/2/110208-jules-verne-google-doodle-183rd-birthdayanniversary. 106 Donovan Alexander, “Prophet or Futurist? 7 Technologies Jules Verne Predicted Leagues Ahead of His Time”, 6 February 2019. https://interestingengineering.com/prophet-or-futurist-7-tec hnologies-jules-verne-predicted-leagues-ahead-of-his-time. 104

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Table 5 Science Fiction predictions of Jules Verne that became Science Fact

95

Technologies predicted by Jules Verne Electric stun gun

Splashdown spaceship

Electric submarines

Helicopter

Holograms with sound

Newscasts

Space travel

Sky writing

Video conferencing

Solar sails

who put forward the idea in 1861.107 The inventive imagination of Jules Verne however was enough to put the spark of inspiration into the rocket pioneers who would eventually make it a reality. Both Kepler as the original ‘father’ of science fiction and Jules Verne who brought science fiction as a form of entertainment to the masses, were constrained to conveying their ideas via the printed form. It was however another medium that would present rocket technology into the reality of an even greater mass audience, in the form of science fiction cartoons and film. When film technology arrived on the scene it presented a new medium of expression for the science fiction genre, with the very first science fiction film though featuring a very definitive space theme however it involved no rocket. Produced in 1902 by pioneering French filmmaker Georges Méliès the revolutionary film A Trip to The Moon was to inspire a new generation.108 A very short film only 18 min in total, it depicts the journey of a couple of scientists, members of the ‘Astronomers Club,’ to the Moon; using a giant cannon to propel their craft to the lunar surface, where they encounter some hostile locals and subsequently return to Earth via gravity before splashing into a body water.109 The theme that Méliès depicted in his film was to become a familiar framework for successive generations to follow; a small team of adventurers travelling through space fending back adversity in and during their journey.110 Méliès in turn was also greatly influenced by the writings of JulesVerne in creating the script and in actual fact the film featured many similarities found in the epic From the Earth to the Moon published in 1865.111 Space has remained a very popular science fiction topic and it is reflected in its popularity amongst science fiction writers and film directors alike. In a 2019

107

Associated Press News, “Canadian university head proposed rocket spaceflight in 1861”, 5 October 2015, https://apnews.com/article/8fbf774661ec457787b8d7a671b2b0b9. 108 Pauline D-L Méliès, “Georges Méliès—Official Website”, https://www.melies.eu/English. html. 109 Alissa Wilkinson, “How Georges Méliès’ films are still influencing cinema, more than 100 years later”, 3 May 2018, https://www.vox.com/culture/2018/5/3/17311222/georges-meliesgoogle-doodle-trip-moon-conquest-pole-effects. 110 IMDB, “A Trip to the Moon—1902”, https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0000417/ 111 Jules Verne, From the Earth to the Moon. Fourth. Translated by Lowell Blair, (New York: Penguin Random House, 1865/2008).

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analysis of their Top 25112 science fiction topics, US based publisher Barnes & Nobel listed more than 40% as having a space related theme, similar with films; with seven out of the Top Ten113 highest earning science fiction films of all time also revolving around a space related theme. And as with the early rocket pioneers, space themed science fiction has continued to serve as inspiration for a new generation of space and rocket pioneers. In a 2013 interview, Elon Musk, the South African born tech entrepreneur mentioned reading the classic Douglas Adams work The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy at a young age and the inspirational influence it had on him which invariably contributed to shaping his future path, which was to include launching his own private rocket company, featuring reusable self-landing first-stages a feature that used to be relegated to the pages of science fiction.114 On 30 May 2020, almost five decades after the launch of Apollo 11, the most concurrent viewers ever at the time logged into a dedicated website for a very special live streaming NASA event; the first launch of a crewed spacecraft by a commercial company.115 When the SpaceX Falcon Heavy116 rocket ascended the launchpad at NASA’s Kennedy Space Centre not only were more than ten million people watching, but as a private public partnership it also mirrored the one described by Jules Verne in From the Earth to the Moon.117 This event took place at the same site which a bit more than fifty years prior, hosted the Saturn V rocket launch used to transport the first humans to the lunar surface. What was different this time though, where fifty years ago the Saturn V ditched its first and second launch stages in the ocean, nine minutes after the launch of the Falcon Heavy its first stage landed safely back on Earth; on a drone ship in the Atlantic ocean a few hundred kilometres off the coast of Florida to be available for reuse in a future launch.118 This ability to successfully land the first stage of its launch vehicles has given SpaceX,119 the private rocket company founded in 2002 by Elon Musk (with the greater purpose of someday sending a human mission to Mars), a definitive cost advantage as the first stage represents a significant portion of the total launch cost. By September 2020 the company has had

112

Ross Johnson, “The 25 Greatest Science Fiction Tropes, Ranked”, 16 January 2019, https:// www.barnesandnoble.com/blog/sci-fi-fantasy/the-25-greatest-science-fiction-tropes-ranked/ 113 Brooke Bajgrowicz, “The 10 Highest-Grossing Sci-Fi Films of All Time”, 31 December 2019, https://screenrant.com/highest-grossing-sci-fi-films-all-time/ 114 Alison van Diggelen, “Transcript of Elon Musk Interview: Iron Man, Growing up in South Africa”, 7 February 2013, https://www.freshdialogues.com/2013/02/07/transcript-of-elon-muskinterview-with-alison-van-diggelen-iron-man-growing-up-in-south-africa/ 115 Mike Wall, “SpaceX’s 1st astronaut launch was NASA’s most-watched online event ever”, 2 June 2020, https://www.space.com/nasa-spacex-astronaut-launch-viewer-record.html. 116 SpaceX, “Falcon Heavy”, https://www.spacex.com/vehicles/falcon-heavy/ 117 Mike Wall, “SpaceX’s 1st astronaut launch was NASA’s most-watched online event ever”, 2 June 2020, https://www.space.com/nasa-spacex-astronaut-launch-viewer-record.html. 118 Mike Wall, “SpaceX rocket returns to shore after historic astronaut launch”, 3 June 2020, https://www.space.com/spacex-falcon-9-rocket-returns-shore-after-astronaut-launch.html. 119 SpaceX, “SpaceX”, https://www.spacex.com/

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sixty successful recoveries of its Falcon rocket first stages.120 121 Perhaps fitting with the science fiction nature of the industry Elon Musk named the two SpaceX recovery drone ships, used as oceanic landing pads for the returning SpaceX first stage sections, respectively the Of Course I Still Love You (Atlantic Ocean) and the Just Read the Instructions in the Pacific in honour of one of his favourite science fiction writers—the late author Iain M. Banks.122 Rather peculiar sounding, these are named after two fictional ‘sentient’ spaceships featured in the Culture series of books; about a future spacefaring ‘post scarcity society’ ruled by an advanced AI characterised by a symbiotic coexistence of humans and machines.123 Though it took more than five decades for the self-landing rocket to become a reality, in science fiction however this was predicted even before the ‘space race’ commenced in the 1950s and it was not the only thing; rockets would be nuclear and could take many different forms. In the following section the early science fiction rocket will be briefly explored.

4.4

The Science Fiction Rocket

In 1920 the Smithsonian Institute published a paper written by rocket pioneer Robert Goddard called Reaching High Altitudes in which travelling to the Moon using a rocket was postulated.124 Goddard’s misunderstood and largely misrepresented article was heavily criticised by the mainstream press, with the influential New York Times newspaper giving it a particularly scathing review, publishing an article on 13 January 1920 dismissing the idea that a rocket could ever work in space. On 17 July 1969 with the first astronauts well on their way to the Moon, that newspaper issued a correction of the article.125 Though the mainstream press might have dismissed Goddard’s idea, and the article did not reference human spaceflight at all, it nonetheless created a popular frenzy about ‘Moon rockets’ amongst the general population and the concept soon found its way into cartoons

120

Erik Gregersen, “Elon Musk—American entrepreneur”, 27 August 2020, https://www.britan nica.com/biography/Elon-Musk. 121 Amy Thompson, “SpaceX launches 60 Starlink internet satellites, sticks rocket landing”, 3 September 2020, https://www.space.com/spacex-starlink-11-satellites-launch-september-2020. html. 122 Isaiah Alonzo, “LOOK: Elon Musk’s SpaceX Drone Ship Is a Huge Nod and Dedication to His Favorite Novel Series, Iain Bank’s Culture!—Is the CEO the Ultimate Fanboy?”, https://www. techtimes.com/articles/252675/20200918/look-elon-musks-spacex-drone-ship-huge-nod-dedica tion-favorite.htm. 123 Ibid. 124 Robert H. Goddard, “A method of reaching extreme altitudes”, Nature (1920): 809–811. 125 Kiona N. Smith, “The Correction Heard ’Round The World: When The New York Times Apologized to Robert Goddard”, 19 July 2018, https://www.forbes.com/sites/kionasmith/2018/ 07/19/the-correction-heard-round-the-world-when-the-new-york-times-apologized-to-robert-god dard/?sh=3cc41a374543.

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and films in the USA.126 On the other side of the Atlantic Goddard’s’ contemporary rocket pioneer Hermann Oberth, had his own problems with a publication, when his original doctoral thesis was rejected by the University of Heidelberg. He published it himself in book form in 1923 as The Rocket into Planetary Space which became a reference work in itself.127 Oberth was by then well established as rocket expert and since his book created such a fascination with spaceflight in Germany, he was probably the logical choice when asked by director Fritz Lang to serve as technical advisor for the first ever film to depict human spaceflight as a realistic possibility. The plot of the 1929 German silent film Die Frau im Mond (Woman in the Moon) revolves around two concepts that have indeed in reality presented itself in the modern space industry namely a privately funded Moon bound mission and mining on the Moon; the film was released under the name By Rocket to the Moon in 1931 in the USA.128 The rocket in the film as well as the spaceships featured in popular cartoons of the period such as Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon shared certain common traits. Most were depicted as sleek all metal aerodynamic missile shaped objects with most sporting various shapes of protruding fins, essentially reflecting the typical Art Deco elements characterizing design of the era. Art Deco was a popular design influence which peaked in the early 1930’s. It featured objects comprised out of streamlined surfaces characterized by a variety of bold geometric shapes including flowing curves, smooth lines and stepped designs. Although mostly associated with architecture it was popular in industrial design as well, where it favored the use of modern materials (for the era) such as aluminum, plastic and stainless steel in the design construction to accentuate modern technology and progress and to project a future facing idea.129 During the 1930’s Art Deco evolved into the socalled ‘Streamline Moderne’ which emphasised flowing lines and aerodynamic shapes borrowed from the aviation industry and started incorporating these elements into general industrial design, ranging from cars to ocean liners.130 Whereas the By Rocket to the Moon featured a symmetrical design for the vertically launched rocket, the rocket ships in the cartoons were slightly different. The Buck Rogers cartoon strip in particular featured a rocket ship more akin to an airship design and

126

Frank H. Winter, “The Misunderstood Professor”, Air & Space Magazine, May 2008, https:// www.airspacemag.com/space/the-misunderstood-professor-26066829/ 127 Joachim Kehr, “The Transylvanian Rocket Scientist Who Invented Space Travel and Got Funded by a Movie Director”, 1 May 2017, https://blog.degruyter.com/transylvanian-rocket-scient ist-got-funded-science-fiction-director/ 128 J. Hoberman, “When Fritz Lang Shot the Moon”, New York Times, 27 June 2019, https://www. nytimes.com/2019/06/27/arts/fritz-lang-woman-in-the-moon.html. 129 Anika Daˇ ci´c, “What is Art Deco? Everything You Need To Know About the Most Popular Early 20th Century Decorative Style”, 11 November 2015, https://www.widewalls.ch/magazine/what-isart-deco-decorative-style. 130 Lorenzo Pereira, “The Most Beautiful Examples of Art Deco Patterns”, 20 September 2016, https://www.widewalls.ch/magazine/art-deco-patterns/emile-jacques-ruhlmann-cabinet.

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Fig. 4 Artistic interpretation of two different Art Deco inspired rockets. (Graphic courtesy of the author)

‘flying’ like an airplane in a horizontal plane, but powered by a rocket engine.131 The Flash Gordon cartoon on the other hand, had a rocket ship with remarkable interplanetary capability despite the fact that it was built as a backyard project by one Dr. Zarkov. It featured in addition to the airplane inspired design features, a periscope traditionally found in a submarine; the craft took-off and landed horizontally.132 Figure 4 provides an interpretation of the Art Deco inspired characteristics of early era science fiction film rockets, with the image on the left depicting an interpretation of the rocket featured in Die Frau im Mond and on the right a 1950’s style ‘atomic’ rocket. Rockets featured in later films still incorporated the flowing Art Deco look with a vertical stance, reminding the casual observer of the V-2 rockets used during World War 2. Two iconic later examples being the rockets featured in the 1950 science fiction film Destination Moon and the similar sounding cartoon published in the same year The Adventures of Tintin: Destination Moon. Originally published in 1950 by Belgian cartoon artist Georges Prosper Remi better known as Hergé as a serialised cartoon, as with the other Tintin works The Adventures of Tintin: Destination Moon was subsequently published in book form to join one of the most successful cartoon series in the world; seventy years later the books are still on the market with over 230 million copies sold and it has been translated into

131

Smithsonian Institute, “National Air and Space Museum”, https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/edi torial/buck-rogers-spaceship-toy. 132 Frederick Stephani, “Flash Gordon: Rocket Ship, 1936”, https://pioneersofflight.si.edu/content/ flash-gordon-rocket-ship.

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70 languages.133 The front cover of The Adventures of Tintin: Destination Moon features what probably is one of the most looked at rockets in the cartoon world, an iconic missile shaped spacecraft with a distinctive elegant design clad in red and white squares. The film Destination Moon featured a rocket similar in design called ‘Luna’ with the film winning the 1950 Oscar for special effects.134 These two rockets had distinctive technical similarities; firstly both rockets were fully contained self-propelled spacecraft, with the ability to launch from the Earth in one piece, land on the Moon and return to Earth to land in its original form without shedding any ‘parts’ and secondly both were nuclear powered. The idea of an ‘atomic powered rocket’ entered popular culture in 1950, compliments of the already mentioned pioneering science fiction film Destination Moon; a film credited with inspiring the explosion of science fiction films which were to become a hallmark from 1955 onward.135 In the film a privately funded rocket is developed in secret, as public opinion was turned against the idea of a nuclear powered rocket and the potential hazards associated with radiation leakage. The danger of consequential damage associated with nuclear technology and atomic weapons were to become a theme in its own right in future science fiction works. Films like Godzilla and Them! both released in 1954, explored the topic of hidden danger associated with nuclear technology, such as the unintended biological alteration in the form of giant mutated ants (Them!136 ) and a radioactive giant dinosaur (Godzilla137 ) amongst others. In the film Destination Moon the single-stage atomic powered rocket ‘Luna’, after a successful launch from Earth touches down on the Moon from which it subsequently departs to return to Earth.138 Ironically the first craft to reach the surface of the Moon launched from Earth was called Luna-2, launched by the USSR on 14 September 1959 it deposited nine metallic spheres containing Soviet-era symbols on the lunar surface.139 In the world outside of science fiction the nuclear rocket was a very strong consideration at some point, and actively researched. Another depiction of rocket technology in early science fiction took the form of a wearable device which enabled its user to fly through the air and would become a staple technology in films and cartoons alike—the so-called ‘Rocketbelt’ or ‘Jetpack.’ The ‘Jetpack’ was not a new idea in entertainment culture it had already featured in a number of forms, in actual fact it can be traced back to

133

Paul Aleixo, “Tintin: as the eternal youth turns 90, he’s still teaching children about the world”, 9 January 2019, https://theconversation.com/tintin-as-the-eternal-youth-turns-90-hes-stillteaching-children-about-the-world-109533. 134 CSIE, “Destination Moon”, https://www.csie.ntu.edu.tw/~b2506017/sf/5k.htm. 135 Cyndy Hendershot, “From trauma to paranoia: Nuclear weapons, science fiction, and history”, Mosaic: A Journal for the Interdisciplinary Study of Literature (1999): 73–90. 136 TCM.,”Them!”, http://www.tcm.com/watchtcm/movies/16456/Them-/ 137 Steve Ryfle, “Godzilla’s Conscience: The Monstrous Humanism of Ishiro Honda”, https:// www.criterion.com/current/posts/6648-godzilla-s-conscience-the-monstrous-humanism-of-ishirohonda. 138 CSIE, “Destination Moon”, https://www.csie.ntu.edu.tw/~b2506017/sf/5k.htm. 139 NASA, “Luna 02”, https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/luna-02/in-depth/

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the late 1920’s when the world was introduced to the idea of a ‘Rocket-belt’ by a comic book character called Buck Rogers.140 He was an American World War I pilot who woke up in the twenty-fifth century after suffering an accident of some sorts. He introduces the reader to a number of wonderful inventions amongst them the ‘Rocket-belt’. In the 1949 serial film called King of the Rocket Men the main character also uses an ‘atomic powered’ rocket pack which was attached to a jacket of the pilot and was worn in conjunction with an aerodynamic helmet, needless to say this type of rocket pack has not made it to reality just as yet.141 It was The Jetsons however, an animated cartoon series, more than any other influence that brought the word ‘Jetpack’ into the general culture. The timing of the series was appropriate as at the time the ‘space race’ was heating up. The ‘Space Race142 ’ was the colloquial term for the technological ‘showdown’ between the USA and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) which was essentially a proxy for the ‘Cold War’ in itself a battle of capitalism vs. communism.143 In 1957 the USSR launched Sputnik, the word literally meaning fellow traveller, the first artificial satellite successfully placed in Earth-orbit beating the USA to it.144 In 1961 on April 12, the USA’s ambition to take a lead in the space race was dealt another blow, when Yuri Gagarin became the first human to officially orbit the Earth in a spacecraft called Vostok 1.145 In response to the early success of the USSR the US President John F. Kennedy upped the ante in the space race. During a Congressional address on 25 May 1961 requesting funds for a very ambitious project, namely to place a human on the lunar surface.146 The Jetsons, incidentally one of the first programs to be broadcast in colour, made its debut towards the end of 1962 on 23 September on the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) television network, just twelve days after President Kennedy publicly announced the ambition of the USA to put a human on the Moon before the decade was out in the now famous speech at Rice University in Houston on 11 September

140

John H. Lienhard, “Engines of our ingenuity: No. 1092—Rocket Belt”, https://uh.edu/engines/ epi1092.htm. 141 Tod Gault, “Serial of the Month for September 2002”, https://web.archive.org/web/201301210 80634/http://www.serialexperience.com/showarticle.php. 142 Adam Mann, “What Was the Space Race?”, 7 August 2019, https://www.space.com/space-race. html. 143 The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica, “Cold War”, 20 July 1998, https://www.britannica. com/event/Cold-War. 144 Mike Wall, “Sputnik 1! 7 Fun Facts About Humanity’s First Satellite”, 12 October 2017, https:// www.space.com/38331-sputnik-satellite-fun-facts.html. 145 History.com, “Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becomes the first man in space”, 9 February 2010, https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/first-man-in-space. 146 John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, “Space Program”, https://www.jfklibrary. org/learn/about-jfk/jfk-in-history/space-program.

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1962.147,148 At the time of the launch of The Jetsons the space race had already permeated society culturally in many different ways. A very visible example being the ‘Googie’ style of building architecture which reflected what was considered to be ‘the look of the future’—the ‘Theme Building’ at Los Angeles International Airport is a principal example.149 The series was aimed at the children’s market and had a strong future theme which suited the zeitgeist of the space race era and provided a view on the future portrayed through the actions of a spacefaring family called the Jetsons, who had at their disposal a number of wondrous inventions implied to be the norm in any future scenario. Along with a plethora of futurefantastic conveniences, the family had at their disposal any number of ways to get around including flying cars, moving sidewalks and their seemingly perennial favourite way—the ‘Jetpack’. These fantastic future gadgets were very influential in shaping and inspiring ideas due to the age bracket of its target audience and the original series is still considered culturally relevant science fiction. The concepts described by science fiction in this section such as the rocket-belt and, the nuclear rocket might have sounded far-fetched at the time, but in actual fact very real efforts were made to create some of these devices; some of which eventually finding its way into aspects of the modern space program. The next section will aim to provide a short overview of the ‘science-fact’ nuclear rocket and ‘Jetpack’.

4.4.1

The Nuclear Rocket

In August of 1945 the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were effectively destroyed by two bombs, dropped three days apart and as such introducing the world to the terrifying power of nuclear weapons. Whilst this act signalled an end to World War II it simultaneously heralded the beginning of a new period—the ‘Atomic Age.’150 In the USA, a society both awed and terrified by the destructive power, people became fascinated with nuclear technology to such an extent that atomic tourism became a viable income for the city of Las Vegas, which even temporarily became known as ‘Atomic City’ due to its proximity to the Nevada Proving Grounds; where between 1951 and 1955 forty-five nuclear fission weapons

147

Matt Novak, “50 Years of the Jetsons: Why The Show Still Matters”, 19 September 2012, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/50-years-of-the-jetsons-why-the-show-still-matters43459669/ 148 Abigail Malangone, “We Choose to Go to the Moon: The 55th Anniversary of the Rice University Speech”, 2 September 2017, https://jfk.blogs.archives.gov/2017/09/12/we-choose-to-go-tothe-moon-the-55th-anniversary-of-the-rice-university-speech. 149 Beau Peregoy, “5 of the Best Googie Buildings in L.A.”, 19 December 2016, https://www.arc hitecturaldigest.com/gallery/googie-buildings-la. 150 Amy Briggs, “Twists of fate made Nagasaki a target 75 years ago” 5 August 2020, https://www. nationalgeographic.com/history/2020/08/twists-fate-made-nagasaki-target-atomic-bomb/

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were detonated.151 In Las Vegas detonation times were publicized and observers could enjoy an ‘Atomic Cocktail’ even sporting an ‘Atomic’ hairstyle whist staring at a mushroom cloud in the distance from landmark locations such as the Flamingo Hotel.152 The atomic age also brought with it the ‘Cold War’ a period described by the writer George Orwell as a time during which the world was kept in a permanent stalemate situation by “two or three monstrous super-states, each possessed of a weapon by which millions of people can be wiped out in a few seconds.”153 This period, which is generally considered from 1946 till the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991—was defined by international rivalry between the Western Bloc nations (USA and allies) on the one hand and the Eastern Bloc, USSR and Allies on the other.154 A number of significant international incidents occurred during the Cold War, one in particular would bring the world precariously close to a nuclear ‘hot’ war; a fourteen day standoff in October 1962 generally known as the Cuban missile crises.155 The cold war period also had its benefits though, as it was characterised by a rapid increase in the pace of technological development; one of the by-products being the ‘Space Race’ which would ultimately contribute greatly to the advancement of science and society.156 The ‘Space Race’ pitted the technological prowess of the USA and USSR in terms of aerospace development ranging from artificial satellites to the ultimate prize of landing a human on the Moon; and any and all technological requirements in-between. Crucial to all of these ambitions were the development of the reliable launch technology required to get a spacecraft from Earth to space and since it was the ‘Atomic’ age, the idea of an atomic rocket was born.157 Research into the principle of using nuclear technology as an augmentation (if not alternative) to chemical rockets for space exploration was put forward as early on as 1944 when Stanislaus Ulam and Frederick de Hoffman proposed that the same power used to produce an atomic explosion could be used to launch space

151

PBS, “The Atomic Age”, https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/lasvegas-ato mic-age/ 152 PBS, “Atomic Tourism in Nevada”, https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/ atomic-tourism-nevada/ 153 The Editors of Encyclopaedia. Britannica, “Cold War—international politics”, https://www.bri tannica.com/event/Cold-War. 154 Erin Blakemore, “What was the Cold War?”, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/top ics/reference/cold-war/ 155 JFK Library, “Cuban Missile Crisis”, https://www.jfklibrary.org/learn/about-jfk/jfk-in-history/ cuban-missile-crisis. 156 Jha Martand, “This is How the Space Race Changed the Great Power Rivalry Forever”, July 27, 2017, https://nationalinterest.org/feature/how-the-space-race-changed-the-great-power-rivalry-for ever-21690. 157 Adam Mann, “What Was the Space Race?”, 7 August 7, 201, https://www.space.com/spacerace.html.

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Table 6 The basics of Nuclear thermal propulsion Nuclear Thermal Propulsion—Three Facts 1

Powered By Fission Uranium atoms are split (fission) inside a reactor core producing heat which is used to heat up a liquid propellant which is pumped through it in the process creating a gas, subsequently converted into thrust when expanded through an exhaust nozzle

2

More Efficient Than Chemical Rockets Double the efficiency of a chemical rockets due to its high energy density i.e. traveling further on less fuel

3

Not for Launch Nuclear propulsion does not produce the amount of thrust needed required to launch a craft from the Earth, it is thus designed as a latter propulsion device during a long-term space journey i.e. a Mars trip

bound craft.158 A formal study was commissioned in 1955, called the Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Application (NERVA) program of which the primary goal was to demonstrate the concept of a nuclear powered rocket engine viable for use in space travel. The then US Atomic Energy Commission and NASA had revolved around the concept of a nuclear thermal rocket engine.159 A ‘nuclearthermal’ rocket engine follows the principle, whereby a liquid propellant is superheated to produce enough thrust for propulsion through an exhaust nozzle, using a nuclear reaction as the heat source (refer Table 6).160,161 During the time the program was active a number of practical examples of nuclear powered rocket engines (refer Table 7) were built and tested at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in the US state of New Mexico known as project Rover.162 Initially the nuclear rocket concept was very enthusiastically supported in the early part of the space race with the following quote from a 1961 article published by the US Airforce showing the partisan support for the technology—“Most experts not only refrain from criticizing the Rover-type nuclear rocket …but the vast majority consider it to be the cornerstone of a successful space program”.163 In

158

William R. Corliss and Francis C. Schwenk, Nuclear Propulsion for Space, Understanding the Atom Series, (Washington DC: US Atomic Energy Commission, 1971). 159 NASA, “An Historical Perspective of the NERVA Nuclear Rocket Engine Technology Program”, https://ntrs.nasa.gov/citations/19910017902. 160 NASA, “Inside the LEO Doghouse: Nuclear Thermal Engines”, https://blogs.nasa.gov/J2X/tag/ nuclear-thermal-propulsion/ 161 Energy.gov, “6 Things You Should Know About Nuclear Thermal Propulsion”, https://www. energy.gov/ne/articles/6-things-you-should-know-about-nuclear-thermal-propulsion. 162 Los Alamos National Laboratory, “Project Rover: Main Series of Nuclear-Rocket Engines”, https://www.lanl.gov/science/NSS/issue1_2011/story4a.shtml. 163 J. S. Butz Jr., “Rover—the Nuclear Way to Space”, Airforce Magazine, 1 June 196, https://www. airforcemag.com/article/0661space/

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Table 7 Project Rover nuclear rocket engines Project Rover Kiwi A

It was the initial phase of Project Rover produced a number of reactors between 1959 and 1964. Not intended to be ‘flyable’ engines hence they were named after a flightless bird, serving as proof of concept only

Kiwi B

An improved version of the Kiwi A series, it produced ten times more power in a smaller form factor

Phoebus-1 Similar in size to the Kiwi B, this engine was aimed at the needs of an interplanetary mission; it focussed on power density improvements and was first successfully tested in 1965 Phoebus-2 The largest of all the engines built during Project Rover, it represented a significant improvement on the version it superseded, and the reactor was considered to be the most powerful nuclear reactor ever built at the time; producing 4 Gigawatts during testing in 1968 Pewee

Designed as a pocket version of the initial Kiwi series, it was aimed at providing propulsion for unmanned interplanetary missions, capable of producing 500 megawatts, it was also the smallest physically of all the engines designed during the program

Table 8 NERVA / Project Rover’s significant numbers

NERVA/Project Rover165 4.500 megawatts of thermal power

3.038 °C (3.311° K) exhaust temperature

1.112.055 N of thrust

850 s of specific impulse

90 min of burn time

A 3:4 thrust-to-weight ratios

the end reality proved to be different and NERVA/Rover was shutdown formally in 1972, with not a single rocket used in the space program. The project proved the feasibility of propulsion, albeit within constraints, associated with the nuclear rocket engine and it could rightfully list a number of notable achievements (refer Table 8) notched up during NERVA / Project Rover.164 Though the initial research revolved around the principle of a nuclear thermal rocket engine, another type of nuclear rocket engine exists as well; the ‘Nuclearelectric’ rocket engine. In this type of engine the nuclear reaction is used to generate electricity which in turn is used to produce the high velocity ions required for the process of ion-propulsion.166 Ion engines produces thrust by accelerating ions which are created from ionizing a propellant of a suitably high atomic mass

164

Los Alamos National Laboratory, “NUCLEAR ROCKETS: To Mars and Beyond”, https:// www.lanl.gov/science/NSS/issue1_2011/story4full.shtml. 165 Los Alamos National Laboratory, “NUCLEAR ROCKETS: To Mars and Beyond”, https:// www.lanl.gov/science/NSS/issue1_2011/story4full.shtml. 166 NASA, “Inside the LEO Doghouse: Nuclear Thermal Engines”, https://blogs.nasa.gov/J2X/tag/ nuclear-thermal-propulsion/

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such as xenon, and are commonly used technology in the modern space industry to position geosynchronous Earth orbit (GEO) communication satellites and has also been used to power deep space missions.167

4.4.2

The Jetpack and Rocket Belt

Through the years the terms ‘Rocket-belt’ and ‘Jetpack’ became a staple technology in films and cartoons and started to be used interchangeably in popular culture. Though the term ‘Jetpack’ was popularised by cartoon show The Jetsons not much is known about the inner workings of a ‘Jetson-era ‘Jetpack’ and chances are that it actually refers to a ‘rocket’ pack, as there is a principle difference between the two. A rocket pack does not need an ambient source of oxygen as it carries all its fuel and oxidizer within the system and is thus fully self-contained and can create the combustion necessary for thrust without the need for any input from its environment.168 A jet on the other hand needs to take in air as a source of oxygen which is subsequently compressed in a turbine where it is mixed with fuel and combusted creating the required thrust for propulsion.169 Ironically, the device featured in the 1991 film The Rocketeer 170 based on graphic novel created in 1982 by American artist and writer Dave Stevens in essence more ticks the boxes for a ‘Jetpack’ than rocket-belt.171 In 1959 the US Army put out request for proposals for a ‘Small Rocket Lift Device’ which was to become known simply as a ‘Rocket-belt.’ Bell AeroSystems came up with a working prototype, though hardly a ‘belt’ it did however managed to fly, albeit it not very long and for extremely short distances.172 The system took the shape of a rather large backpack (91.4 × 92.7 × 88.9 cm) attached to the pilot using nylon straps and flown with steel cables to control the nozzles, constructed out of mostly aluminium and fibreglass it weighed in at just under 30 kg.173 Eventually discarded as a practical consideration for the US Army and the prototype donated to the Smithsonian Museum. Although the project was scrapped it did capture the public’s imagination and even made an appearance as a James Bond

167

NASA, “NASA—Ion Propulsion”, https://www.nasa.gov/centers/glenn/about/fs21grc.html. Elizabeth Howell, “How Do Space Rockets Work Without Air?”, 9 April 2013, https://www. livescience.com/34475-how-do-space-rockets-work-without-air.html. 169 Colin Cutler, “How Does A Turbofan Engine Work?”, 21 January 2020, https://www.boldme thod.com/learn-to-fly/aircraft-systems/how-does-a-jet-engine-turbofan-system-work-the-basics/ 170 Roger Ebert, “The Rocketeer”, https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-rocketeer-1991. 171 George Gene Gustines, “Dave Stevens, 52, Artist Who Created the Rocketeer, Dies”, 30 March 2008, https://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/30/arts/design/30stevens.html. 172 Jeff MacGregor, “The Ill-Fated History of the Jet Pack”, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smi thsonian-institution/ill-fated-history-’Jetpack’-180955294/. 173 Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, “Rocket Belt, Bell No. 2”, https://airandspace. si.edu/collection-objects/rocket-belt-bell-no-2/nasm_A19730264000. 168

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Table 9 Timeline examples of ‘Jetpacks’ in reality

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Year (CE)

‘Jetpack’ Description

Propulsion

1944

“Himmelstürmer”175

Pulse Tubes

1969

Jet Flying Belt by Bell AeroSystems176

Jet Turbine

1980

Williams International WASP & X-Jet177

Jet Turbine

2008

Yves Rossy’s Jet Wingpack178

Jet Turbine

Air179

2016

Zapata ™Flyboard

2017

Gravity180

Jet Turbine Jet Turbine

2018

JB-10/11 JetPack Aviation181

Jet Turbine

‘gadget’ in the 1965 film Thunderball.174 Over the years many attempts were made to fashion different versions of the ‘Jetpack’s and make it ‘mainstream’ Table 9 lists a number such notable attempts at bringing the ‘Jetpacks’ to life. There were other devices which could qualify colloquially as a ‘Jetpack’ however these were driven by normal internal combustion piston engines driving ducted fans; a fan mounted within a surrounding shroud or duct. These are ideal for propulsion systems for use in close proximity of a pilot as the moving parts are less exposed than say a propeller, some examples are depicted in Table 10. Examples of systems which could qualify as a ‘Rocket-belt’ also includes the examples which were designed for use by astronauts in space most of which relies on compressed gas (refer Table 11) ironically predicted in a 1950 science fiction film.

174

007James.com, “Thunderball Gadget—Jet Pack”, https://www.007james.com/gadgets/jet_pac k.php. 175 Jack Knight, “Of Course, We Knew this…Nazi Secret Inventions, The Jetpack”, 30 November 30, 2015, https://www.warhistoryonline.com/world-war-ii/of-course-we-knew-this-nazi-secret-inv entions-the‘Jetpack’.html. 176 Thomas Ricker, “The Future Passed: Jetpack edition”, 3 November 2011, https://www.the verge.com/2011/11/3/2504531/‘Jetpack’-history-future-passed. 177 CBS News, “Jet packs in flight and fiction”, https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/jet-packs-in-fli ght-and-fiction/12/ 178 Loz Blain, “Jetman Yves Rossy can now take off from the ground … autonomously”, 19 December 2019, https://newatlas.com/aircraft/jetman-yves-rossy-vtol-ground-takeoff/ 179 Merrit Kennedy, “This Time, Franky Zapata Makes It Across The English Channel On A Hoverboard”, 5 August 2019. https://www.npr.org/2019/08/05/748219809/this-time-franky-zap ata-makes-it-across-the-english-channel-on-a-hoverboard. 180 Ray Parisi, “I got to test drive a $440,000 flying jet suit—it was terrifying and totally addictive”, 22 October 2018, https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/22/i-got-to-test-drive-a-440000-flying-gra vity-jet-suit.html. 181 JetpackAviation, “Jetpacks”, https://’Jetpack’aviation.com/’Jetpack’s/.

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Table 10 Examples of ‘almost’ jetpacks

Year (CE)

‘Jetpack’ description

1957

Hiller VZ-1 Pawnee182 Piston engine driven ducted fan

Propulsion

2008

Martin Jetpack183

Piston engine driven ducted fan

Table 11 Timeline examples of ‘Rocket-belts’ in reality Year (CE)

‘Rocket-Belt’ Description

Rocket Type

Space Use

1958

Project Grasshopper Jump Belt184

Canisters of Nitrogen

n/a

1963

Bell AeroSystems Rocket Belt185

Chemical Rocket

n/a

1965

EVA (Extra-Vehicular Activity) handheld ‘Zip Gun’186

Pressurized Oxygen Gas Nozzles

Gemini

1967

Bell Pogo187

Chemical Rocket

not used

1972

FCMU (Foot-Controlled Maneuvering Unit)188

Pressurized Nitrogen Gas Nozzles

Skylab

1973

ASMU (Automatically Stabilized Maneuvering)189

Pressurized Nitrogen Gas Nozzles

Skylab

1984

NASA MMU (Manned Manoeuvring Unit)190

Hydrogen Peroxide Thrusters

Space Shuttle

1990

Soviet SPK (Sredstvo Peredvizheniy Kosmonavtov)191 Cosmonaut Maneuvering Equipment

Pressurized Oxygen Gas Nozzles

MIR

1994

SAFER (Simplified Aid for EVA Rescue)192

32 Nozzles Spray Pressurized Nitrogen

ISS

182

Hiller, “Hiller Flying Platform”, https://www.hiller.org/event/flying-platform/ M2K, “Jetpack”, http://www.m2ktechnologies.com/product.php. 184 Thomas Ricker, “The Future Passed: Jetpack edition”, 3 November 2011, https://www.the verge.com/2011/11/3/2504531/‘Jetpack’-history-future-passed. 185 Jon Turi, “Up, up and down: The ephemerality and reality of the ‘Jetpack’”, 2 March 2014, https://www.engadget.com/2014-03-02-the-bell-aerosystems-rocket-belt.html. 186 Bob Granath, “Gemini IV: Learning to Walk in Space”, 1 June 2015, https://www.nasa.gov/fea ture/gemini-iv-learning-to-walk-in-space. 187 Donald E Hewes, Studies of piloting problems of one-man flying units operated in simulated lunar gravity, Presented at the Second National Conference on Space Maintenance, August 6–8. Las Vegas, Nevada.: NASA Langley Research Center, 1968. 188 Donal E. Hewes and Kenneth E. Glove, “Development of Skylab experiment T020 employing a foot controlled maneuvering unit”, NASA Technical Report Server. March 1, 1972, https://ntrs. nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=19720011519. 189 Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, “Maneuvering Unit, Automatically Stabilized, Skylab”, https://airandspace.si.edu/collection-objects/maneuvering-unit-automatically-stabilizedskylab/nasm_A19761951002. 183

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In the film Destination Moon the use of compressed gas as an aide to astronauts conducting an extravehicular activity (EVA)193 the technical name for what is commonly known as a ‘spacewalk’ is depicted in 1950 already. In the film version of the spacewalk, the crew are forced to exit the craft in order to conduct emergency repairs, incidentally one of the primary reasons for actual EVAs in the modern space program. During this spacewalk one of the crewmembers becomes untethered and using an improvised propulsion device in the form of a compressed oxygen tank manages to avert potential disaster and return to the craft.194 Incidentally the first actual spacewalk took place only fifteen years after the release of the film when cosmonaut Alexei Leonov tethered to the Voskhod-2 capsule, left the spacecraft in March 1965 for ten minutes before returning to the craft.195 It is doubtful that the ‘jetpack’ or ‘rocket-belt’ will become a generally adopted form of transport anytime soon; fortunately there is still a lot of interest to drive ongoing research. In August 2019 French inventor Franky Zapata successfully crossed the English Channel on a ducted fan device more akin to a ‘hover board’ than a ‘jetpack’ but using a similar principle.196

4.5

Conclusion

The process of gaining any form of fundamental knowledge is a journey. At its inception uncharted paths on which the ‘traveller’ will encounter many new ideas and insights, in the process ultimately reaching a state of new understanding which at the outset did not exist. A very analogous journey to that of the science fiction writer. Whereas the scientist sets out to frame facts within a set of rules which binds the creative process into a stepwise progression of the empirical process, where the emphasis is first and foremost to create a repeatable condition on which new knowledge can be built to serve generations to come. Though the process is well proven, it is slow and often the very nature of its rigid frameworks could be intimidating to participants, and it is indeed not an infallible process as a number of famous cases have proven indeed. The infamous ‘Piltdown Man’ hoax a case in

190

Andrew Chaikin, “The MMU may have been the coolest space vehicle ever. So why did its career end as soon as it began?”,https://www.airspacemag.com/space/untethered-180952792/ 191 Spacefacts, “Soyuz TM-8”, http://www.spacefacts.de/mission/english/soyuz-tm8.htm. 192 Jennifer Rochlis Zumbado, Pedro H. Curiel, and Sam Schreiner, Hands-free control interfaces for an extra vehicular ‘Jetpack.’, In 2013 IEEE Aerospace Conference. Big Sky, Montana, March 2–9: IEEE, 2013. 1–11. 193 NASA, “What Is a Spacewalk?”, https://www.nasa.gov/audience/forstudents/k-4/stories/nasaknows/what-is-a-spacewalk-k4.html. 194 IMDB, “Destination Moon - User Reviews”, https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0042393/reviews. 195 Alexei Leonov, “The Nightmare of Voskhod 2”, https://www.airspacemag.com/space/the-nig htmare-of-voskhod-2-8655378/ 196 Merrit Kennedy, “This Time, Franky Zapata Makes It Across The English Channel On A Hoverboard”, 5 August 2019. https://www.npr.org/2019/08/05/748219809/this-time-franky-zap ata-makes-it-across-the-english-channel-on-a-hoverboard.

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point, when evolutionary scientists were deceived for decades, basing knowledge on a collection of fake fossils, only found to be a deception in 1953197 and then there was Ptolemy’s geocentric model which lasted a thousand years before being upturned, changing the world. “The ways by which men arrive at knowledge of the celestial things are hardly less wonderful than the nature of these things themselves”198 —in this famous statement Johannes Kepler neatly captures the wonderful nature of the creative process, the transmutation of bits and pieces of unrelated information into foundations of knowledge. In the opinion of this author it also hints at the heart of a ‘greater’ role of science fiction; a seed incubator of original thought that eventually will become ‘science fact’ in one form of the other at some undetermined temporal incidence, a very necessary component if humanity is ever going to become a truly spacefaring race. Another giant step was taken in 2021, one that hinted of a future where a trip to orbital space, not just a suborbital jump lasting mere minutes, could become a reality for a broader sector of humans, when SpaceX a commercial company took a number of paying ‘tourists’ to space. In September 2021 the aptly named Inspiration4 mission took four people on-board a Crew Dragon199 spacecraft powered by a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, not only above the Kármán line, but this group of space tourists went into ‘proper orbit’ where they stayed for three days before returning successfully to earth.200 “The Earth is the cradle of mankind, but mankind cannot stay in the cradle forever.“—Konstantin Tsiolkovsky.201

Christoffel (Chris) Kotze established a boutique technology advisory company in 2012 after a successful corporate career spanning two decades. This company specialises in providing assistance to digital transformation projects within organizations, with a special interest in the use of technology resources to support sustainable development. Current research interests include space technology, dematerialisation through digital transformation and exploring solutions to the ‘digital divide.’ Qualifications include MPhil (Space Science) University of Cape Town, Bachelor of Commerce Honours (Information Systems)—University of Cape Town, Bachelor of Science (Physiology and Microbiology)—University of Pretoria, Diploma in Data-Metrics (Computer Science) University of South Africa, a number of strategy focussed executive management courses

197

Jessie Szalay, “Piltdown Man: Infamous Fake Fossil”, 30 September 2016, https://www.livesc ience.com/56327-piltdown-man-hoax.html. 198 Jeffrey E. Van Cleve, D. A. Caldwell, J. M. Jenkins, S. Bryson, J. Kolodziejczak, P. Gazis, W. J. Borucki, D. G. Koch, and M. R. Haas, “The Knowledge of Celestial Things: Using the Kepler Instrument and Data Analysis Handbooks to Plan Observations and Believe the Results”, AAS 215 (2010): 420–02. 199 SpaceX, “Dragon - Sending humans and cargo into space”, https://www.spacex.com/vehicles/ dragon/. 200 Morgan McFall-Johnsen, “SpaceX’s first space tourists have returned to Earth, splashing down inside the Crew Dragon spaceship”, 19 September 2021, https://www.businessinsider.co.za/spa cex-inspiration4-first-space-tourists-return-to-earth-2021-9. 201 Nola Taylor Redd, “Konstantin Tsiolkovsky: Russian Father of Rocketry”, 27 February 2013, https://www.space.com/19994-konstantin-tsiolkovsky.html.

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at the Graduate School of Business from the University of Cape Town. ISACA Certified in the Governance of Enterprise IT (CGEIT), TOGAF 9 Certified (Enterprise Architecture). He has published a number of publications most of which with a focus on the practical application of space technology, with a special interest in its application with regards to progressing the UN Sustainable Development Goals.