Details
CHESLEY BONESTELL (1888-1986)
EXPLORING COPERNICUS
signed Chesley / Bonestell (lower right)
oil on board
1434 x 26 in. (37.5 x 66 cm.) (sight)
Executed circa 1969.
Provenance
Jane Frank (b. 1942) and Howard Frank (1941-2017), Bethesda, Maryland.
Anonymous sale; Heritage Auctions, Beverly Hills, 15 October 2008, lot 89017.
Acquired at the above sale by the late owner.
Literature
"Russian Astronauts [sic] ... on the Rim of Copernicus," Fantasy and Science Fiction, October 1969, inside front cover, illustrated (Schuetz 389)
Mike Scott, "Collier's Series," Future Life, May 1979, illustrated (Schuetz 508).
Frederick C. Durant III and Ron Miller, Worlds Beyond: The Art of Chesley Bonestell (London, 1983), illustrated (Schuetz 551),
Ron Miller and Frederick C. Durant III, The Art of Chesley Bonestell (London, 2001), pp. 54-55, illustrated.
Jane Frank and Howard Frank, Great Fantasy Art Themes From The Frank Collection (London, 2003), pp. 44-45, illustrated.
Exhibited
Seattle, Washington, Science Fiction Museum, inaugural group show, June 2004-August 2006.
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Lot Essay

A picnic on the Moon: imagination meets reality.

Chesley Bonestell had been painting extraterrestrial landscapes for nearly two decades before the first such images were photographed. This image, however, was based on an actual photograph. In the summer of 1966, the Lunar Orbiter 1 became the first American spacecraft to orbit the Moon. Its mission was to photograph potential landing sites for the Surveyor and Apollo missions. A few month later, Lunar Orbiter II took the photograph on which this painting is based. It was the first photographic true landscape of the Moon (as opposed to strictly overhead views).

Copernicus is a relatively young and bright crater and is easily visible from Earth. To see its topography from an oblique angle was astounding: the rim of the great crater Copernicus, the gentle hills surrounding it, and with the sharp, low peaks of the crater's ejecta in the middle. The press called the Lunar Orbiter II image, "the picture of the century" and compared it to scenes of the American West. Instead of cowboys on the ridge, in Bonestell's imagining, four astronauts are seen overlooking the heart of the crater.

This picture was published in the 20th Anniversary issue of Fantasy and Science Fiction. Melvin H. Schuetz described a scene of Soviet disappointment at coming in second to explore Copernicus: "Russian cosmonauts have landed on the Moon, but find that the Americans have been there first, and that one of them has carved his name on a rock. The name the Russians discover is—'Chesley Bonestell.'"

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