Michael Light, a photographer known for his dramatic landscape photos of the desert of the American Southwest, recently curated an exhibit at New York’s Hayden Planetarium. Not of his own photos however, but photos taken forty years ago by the astronauts of the Apollo Space Missions, 1967 to 1972. Light was granted access by NASA to the master film and archives of these images and spent four years going through more than 32,000 powerful and incredible images. He used digital imaging software to restore the quality of some of the masters, and spent a year creating files for these digital images. He then spent three more years decided which images to include in the exhibit. The process of digital imaging has resulted in prints on a large scale, and with unusually high and crisp resolution. The exhibit was funded generously and made possible by Rita Wilson and Tom Hanks.
The exhibit in New York is drawing photography buffs, and space buffs from around the world, and many are choosing to stay in the best hotels, Manhattan has so many options to choose from. ‘Full Moon’ is the title of the show and is divided into three different presentations. These are ‘The Lunar Surface’, ‘In Orbit Around the Moon’ and ‘The Voyage’. ‘The Lunar Surface’ section is full of photos that astronauts shot while they were standing on the surface of the moon. Lunar landscapes that illustrate the perspective of the astronauts, bizarre and desolate however incredibly beautiful. The section of ‘In Orbit Around the Moon’, consists of the shots taken from the Apollo of the Moon, and are filled with the wonder that was theirs alone, being the first human beings to gaze at the moon in such close proximity. And the third section, ‘The Voyage’ consists of images of the Astronauts themselves, the equipment on the craft, and many photos of Earth. This show is an amazing experience, and has been reviewed as giving human beings different conceptions of the universe and their place in it.
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