Artist’s Statement: Earth sightseeing itinerary for the Moon

Earth sightseeing itinerary for the Moon is inspired by the similarities between artists’ event scores and the Operations Data Files (ODFs) that provide astronauts with step-by-step instructions for their activities. During spaceflight, every moment of an astronaut’s time is governed by a strict schedule: ODFs and checklists dictate, in minute detail, the actions that they must carry out to complete a task. A notable example is the checklist that can be seen stitched to the cuff of the glove that Neil Armostrong wore during the Apollo 11 lunar landing. The checklist instructs Armstrong to carry out a list of activities such as “tether bag” and “photo and bag samples”.

These checklists are necessary in part because astronauts operate on behalf of others, carrying out tasks and experiments that have been designed by teams of scientists, engineers who remain on the Earth. When artists seek to deploy work in space, they too are reliant on astronauts to deploy work on their behalf. Examples such as Eduardo Kac’s Télescope Intérieur (2017), Yasmine Meroz and Liat Segal’s Impossible Object (2022), and Ohad Fishov’s Nothing in Space (2022), are all works intended for deployment or performance in space where the artist is not present, and needed to provide detailed step-by-step instructions for astronauts to produce these works on board the International Space Station. Those astronauts must take components or materials, and, as instructed by artists’ step-by-step instructions, manifest the artists’ vision in the environment of space.

When ODFs or artists’ instructions describe the deployment of an artwork they may be compared to “event scores”, a model established by conceptual artist George Brecht and practiced by artists such as Yoko Ono, which could be performed by the artist themselves or by a third party following written instructions (Kotz 2007: 4). There is, in event scores, a “relinquishing of authorial control” by the artist, moving beyond the “single, original expression” to a “repeatable model” (Robinson 2009: 79).

Earth sightseeing itinerary for the Moon is the list of instructions that might be provided for a mission to Earth. In response to the question, “how does the Moon see the Earth?”, the Moon itself is imagined as the traveller, visiting the Earth for purposes of exploration and data collection. The Moon’s mode of travel to Earth is imagined as falling. This references the nature of orbit, in the three-dimensional environment of space where there is no up or down, in which orbiting objects are endlessly falling towards, and around, the Earth. While terrestrial space travellers must employ tremendous power to propel themselves in the direction of the Moon, Earth sightseeing itinerary… imagines that the Moon may simply choose to drop towards the Earth, serenely and effortlessly.

Building on the artist’s previous work in asemic lettering and pseudo-writing, the work is provided both in a fictional lunar language and in English translation. These glyphs may be the shared language of the Moons in our solar system, or of their lunar inhabitants. Circular forms dominate, informed by the spherical shape of the Earth that dominates the Moon’s field of vision, and by the Moon’s near-circular orbital trajectory.

The work is fantasy, but also, like other artists’ event scores, could be imagined and performed by anyone, either wholly or in part. I invite audiences on Earth to perform activities on this list, imagining that the Earth is new and strange to them; observe humans or collect terrestrial plant samples as if they are curiosities. Consider the potential value of these samples to lunar inhabitants, or to the Moon itself, where sulphates and hydrous minerals, flora and fauna, are rare or unknown. Consider what data you might record from these samples in a report for transmission to the Mother of Moons, Ganymede.