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TEAM 3: Karen Yasinsky and Max Mutchler

Karen Yasinsky is an artist working primarily with animation and drawing. Her video installations and drawings have been shown in many venues internationally including the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo, P.S. 1 in New York, the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles and Kunst Werke in Berlin. Her animations have been screened worldwide at various venues and film festivals, including the Museum of Modern Art and the International Film Festival Rotterdam She is the recipient of a 2002 Guggenheim Foundation grant and teaches at Johns Hopkins University and Maryland Institute College of Art.

Max Mutchler is a scientist who has been working on the Hubble Space Telescope for the entire twenty-year mission, including the Space Shuttle servicing mission last May. As an expert on Hubble’s cameras, Max has been involved in observations of nearby solar system objects, distant galaxies, and many interesting things in between. He is also a member of the Hubble Heritage team that has produced many of the most iconic images from Hubble.

photo by Lisa Van Horn

Max suggests ways to inspire extraordinary voyages

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What deliberate steps can be taken to bridge subcultures, get people to step out of their comfort zones, and possibly inspire an “extraordinary voyage?” Simple juxtapositions or unexpected encounters can stimulate new awareness and thinking, ambushing people’s minds with unexpected ideas in unexpected situations. Here are some recent examples, relating specifically to astronomy and art, that we’d like to see more of ...

  • Hubble images at the Walters Art Gallery

    In 2008, when the Walters Art Museum displayed images of outer space from the Hubble Space Telescope as part of their Maps: Finding our Place in the World exhibit, many Baltimoreans were surprised. In a Baltimore Sun article, Walters Director Gary Vikan wrote about what C.P. Snow once called the “two cultures” of art and science:

    “It’s a chasm that [the Hubble exhibit] Mapping the Cosmos, in its own small way, is helping to bridge. These photos of outer space, like all photographs in art museum exhibitions, earn their public display precisely because of the creative interventions of a talented human being. Here, in the familiar setting of a museum, we are invited, indeed compelled, to contemplate our place in the cosmos, and eternity—and, by extension, our spirituality and our notions of the divine. What art can do more?”

    Photo credit: Zolt Levay, STScI

  • From the Earth to the Universe

    2009 was the International Year of Astronomy (IYA), and an effort was made to place astronomical images in a wide variety of settings worldwide. This project was named “From the Earth to the Universe” (FETTU, in reference to Jules Verne’s From the Earth to the Moon). The stated goal, from the project’s website:

    “The overarching concept for FETTU is presenting astronomical images in the broad context of science, art, and culture. By using beautiful imagery, FETTU aims to expose new audiences to the wonders of the cosmos. Astronomy touches on the largest philosophical questions facing the human race such as where do we come from? Where will we end? How did life arise? Is there life elsewhere in the Universe? Popular images of the cosmos can engage the general public in the science of the knowledge and understanding behind them.”

  • White House star party

    On October 7, 2009, President Obama hosted the first-ever “star party” on the south lawn of the White House, for 150 local middle school students. Max was one of twenty scientists helping to host the event by operating small telescopes. Most of the students had never looked through a telescope, and seeing a vista like Jupiter and its moons with your own eyes can be a transformative experience. Such a sudden and intimate connection with the larger universe often catches people by surprise, and they must overcome some disbelief (along with their disbelief that they are actually hanging out at the White House, in this case).

    The following is an excerpt from President Obama’s speech at the event.

    “From the moment humans first walked on this Earth, as long as we’ve been around, we’ve been trying to unlock the mysteries of the universe and figure out our proper place in the cosmos and somehow make sense of it all. There are a lot of mysteries left, and there are a lot of problems for you students to solve. It’ll take your sense of wonder, your passion, your persistence, your willingness to dedicate your lives to the pursuit of discovery. We need you to think bigger and to dig deeper and to reach higher. And we need your restless curiosity and your boundless hope and imagination. Our future depends on it.”

Additional Links

Jules Verne, From the Earth to the Moon

Extrasolar Planets